This article is about computer associations. For political advocates, see interest group.

In the computer field, a Special Interest Group (SIG) is a community with a particular interest in a specific technical area. SIGs exist for the fields of computing architecture, graphics, security, etc. Members of a SIG cooperate to effect or to produce solutions within their particular field, and often meet regularly, particularly at computing conferences.

In other fields SIGs may be sub-organizations within a larger group, which allow individuals interested in a smaller area, possibly irrelevant to the main group, to meet others who share their particular concerns, without generating the feeling that the purpose of the parent organization is being subverted.

Computing SIGs

• Bluetooth Special Interest Group
• PCI Special Interest Group
• 34 SIGs in the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) include SIGGRAPH, SIGPLAN, SIGCOMM, SIGIR and SIGSAM
• Australian Computer Society
• British Computer Society, where the SIGs are called specialist groups.

See also

• Mensa International#Organizational structure
• Linux User Group