This coming week there is going to be a potentially important conference held where a number of subjects will be discussed including earthquake forecasting. I am deliberately not providing any details so that any negative comments which are posted in response to this note will not interfere with anything.

At the moment one or two of my personal forecasting efforts are scheduled to be discussed along with a number of other projects that I have helped get developed or tried to promote including Roger's probability program and Shan's sun shadow based forecasting procedure. In fact, I understand that there will actually be two separate presentations on Shan's program. One will involve the use of Roger's probability program and other statistical routines to evaluate Shan's forecast data. It is also my understanding that copies of Roger's program are going to be made available to people attending the conference.

I feel that a number of these presentations could have an important impact on the science of forecasting earthquakes. And this is particularly true for one which is presently scheduled to be made on my own earthquake data processing procedures. I feel that they have the potential to help revolutionize earthquake science.

So, keep your fingers crossed. Send a few expressions of hope skywards this weekend. This could represent a rather extraordinary opportunity for the science of earthquake forecasting to move rapidly forward. And with some luck perhaps that is what will happen.