Reflections on CHI 2026

CHI 2026 in Barcelona was part of my original sabbatical plan. CHI is the premier conference spanning all areas of human-computer interaction, and Barcelona is a direct flight from the UK. Read more: Reflections on CHI 2026 It’s been ten years since I last attended CHI 2016 in San Jose. Why so long? I had a baby in 2017, and there was a pandemic in 2020 which significantly reduced for most of us. Beyond those temporal factors, there are structural factors too. CHI is an expensive conference, and travel is expensive since the location rotates between North America, Europe, and Asia. CHI is typically scheduled for April or May, a difficult time to get away from Whitman: April is the “month of 1000 nights” chock full of final presentations and performances, including the Whitman Undergraduate Conference, running up to final exams and Commencement in May. It’s hard to justify attending if I have nothing to present at the conference, but classes to teach at home. I also left CHI 2016 with…