CHI Lites 2018 featured six bite-sized talks on the future of life with technology.
An informal counterpart to the 2018 CHI conference on Human-Computer Interaction, which brought thousands of international researchers to the Palais des Congrès de Montréal, CHI Lites offered an exclusive program featuring six of today’s foremost thinkers on people and technology. It was a chance for the public to gain an insight into emerging research and take away thought-provoking insights.
CHI Lites was video-recorded. Visit the archive to watch the talks!
Event Details
April 22
1:30pm – 4:30 pm
Theatre Sainte Catherine
264 Sainte Catherine Street East
Montreal, Quebec H2X 1L4
Featured Speakers
Alissa Antle
Simon Fraser University
In English speaking countries, approximately 10% of children have dyslexia. Although most of these children have above average to high intelligence, many never become fully literate. Alissa Antle and her team have created a technology that uses 3-D physical letter-blocks to interact with a tablet running a custom reading app, which helps children at risk for dyslexia learn to read and spell. Alissa will tell us how, by transforming the process of reading and…
Joel Fischer
University of Nottingham
Voice interfaces like Siri or Alexa are becoming widespread. Yet, it is early days for this technology. Joel Fischer will explore how people (struggle to) talk to these devices in real life and why talking to them can feel awkward. Drawing on examples, he will share ideas for how we can create voice interfaces that are…
Chris Speed
University of Edinburgh
What happens when we give physical things wallets containing digital currencies? How can this alter power relationships and shift social dynamics? Chris Speed will explore these questions by highlighting the use of smart contracts in design, from a coffee machine that lets you vote for your coffee bean and pays those who clean it, to a hairdryer that trades on the energy market to offer the best price for drying your hair. As objects are connected to the …
Mary Czerwinski
Microsoft Research
How can we create technologies to help us reflect on and change our behavior, improving our health and overall wellbeing? Mary Czerwinski will tell us how she and her team develop smartphone apps to reduce stress and depression, workplace tools to help people stay focused and know when it’s time to take a break, and wearable devices to help families manage tense situations with their children. The goal in all this work is to build technologies that …
Mike Hazas
University of Lancaster
Over the last decade, the growth in data traffic across the Internet has been dramatic, and this is associated with remarkable consumption: one-tenth of global electricity. We need to understand and steer these trends, as Internet energy levels become ever more problematic. Mike Hazas will explore what we know about the energy intensity of digital stuff, and the growth in flows of data over the Internet. He considers how such traffic relates to digital …
Jason Hong
Carnegie Mellon University
Your smartphone might be gathering much more information about you than you realize. Jason Hong’s research has uncovered flashlight apps that want your phone number and card game apps that record your location. Jason will tell us what kinds of data smartphone apps collect, why they collect it, and what you can do about it …
Chair
Ilona Posner
Sr. Consultant
CIBC
CIBC
Ilona Posner is a User Experience Consultant and Educator, working to improve users’ experiences by making technology more useful and usable. Consulting for more than 25 years in the area of Human-Computer Interaction, she has worked on the design and evaluation of websites, software, hardware, mobile applications and business strategies. An experienced educator, Ilona has been teaching both university and professional development courses since 1992, and volunteering as Chair of Programming at TorCHI Toronto’s CHI Chapter and organizing International Student Design Competitions at CHI and UPA conferences. Ilona holds a Masters Degree in Computer Science from the University of Toronto.