Tl;dr – To provide input for this consultation, please fill out our survey. The survey will be open for responses until 15th of November 2024. (As the survey notes, an aspect of this is to look for venues in the global south and outside of our standard rotation.)
Selecting a site for CHI conferences requires balancing important, and often competing, concerns. Looking forward to CHI 2028, 2029, and beyond the CHI Steering Committee is seeking input for potential CHI locations, with a specific call to look beyond the obvious large cities where CHI has been held in the past. This consultation, which will be open until 15th of November, 2024, will help the CHI Steering Committee to request proposals from a broad and more diverse range of locations for the coming years.
The site selection process is described in more detail on the CHI Steering Committee Blog. This detailed blog post covers, for example “As per SIGCHI EC decision, we rotate the conference location through Asia, Eastern North America, Europe, Western North America, and a wildcard year.” However there is much more in the post.
This is the first time the CHI Steering Committee has solicited input from the community on where to hold CHI in the future. The SIGCHI EC had a working group looking at site selection for SIGCHI Conferences more generally.
The CHI Steering Committee has a set of core values which determine which locations will be considered, although these concerns are often challenging to balance.
Safety
Safety of attendees is a key concern for site selection, with many potential dimensions. Critical values of the CHI Steering committee focus on safety for the LGBTQIA+ community, gender equality and safety for all genders, and violence or crime. Issues of safety are crucial to site selection, and will be considered across a broad range of dimensions and will be used to exclude potential locations.
Access
Access and accessibility of location is a key concern for site selection, taking into account that accessibility regulations and standards are often specific and specialised to each location and region. Broader access, including connections by air or train, international travel restrictions and visas, and any other barriers to access will be considered and will be used to exclude potential locations.
Sustainability
CHI is committed to promoting environmental sustainability wherever it is possible. Given the international scope of CHI attendees, one strategy we have pursued is to move the CHI location to different population centers where CHI attendees live and work, reducing our carbon footprint where we can, while recognising that every location choice is going to be distant for some people and geographies. We also look for sites that will be good partners in other types of environmental sustainability including sourcing local foods, reducing supply chains for conference supplies, and reducing needs for air conditioning and other power consuming technologies.
How can you have input?
Well to provide input for this targeted consultation, please fill out our survey. The survey will be open for responses until 15th of November 2024.
At CHI2024, we brought a plan to the Town Hall for a major format change to CHI. We also discussed these changes and the motivation behind them in a blog post a few months ago. To summarize, we are planning to streamline the CHI conference experience by having a program only during the weekdays, and simplifying the formats for presentation. Papers will be delivered in the mornings, and then the afternoons will consist of interactive content divided into five categories. In total, there are six submission areas:
Papers
Panels
Meet up
Posters
Workshops
Interactive demos
There are several reasons to make this change. This change is the first of many iterations to optimize our conference experience as our community and scholarship grows. This format allows us a wider variety of convention centers and other meeting places that both enables us to have the conference in different locations and reduces costs. Avoiding weekend space rental also reduces costs. As we have documented in previous blog posts, CHI has had to make several accommodations to try and break even from a financial perspective, and post-pandemic has been running at a deficit. Many of the changes proposed are designed to assist in that mission of fiscal responsibility. Feedback from CHI participants often mentions the complexity of the program, due in particular to the large number of different tracks. Reducing the number of types of submissions and renaming them to be more self-explanatory is intended to simplify the program and make it easier for newcomers to understand.
We hope that the Meet Up format is considered as a very flexible format that will provide some of the value people have had in our traditional non-paper formats. For example, an organizer could propose a Meet Up that is topically organized around a specific Case-Study, a research tool, or even for networking purposes.
Regarding the Doctoral Consortium track (historically set up as an exclusive meeting between 10-20 PhD students and selected CHI mentors) we are opening this format up by creating a new Chair position that will program mentoring activities of interest to the hundreds of students that attend CHI annually—rather than focusing only on a small group of students. Moreover, SIGCHI sponsors ~25 specialized conferences annually and most of them have a doctoral consortium track that members of the community can apply for—the advantage of these doctoral consortia is that PhD students are able to benefit from mentors in their direct area of expertise, which has been harder to guarantee at CHI since it spans all areas of human-computer interaction.
We presented these changes at CHI2024, and there was an active discussion of the pros and cons of this format. One of the concerns was that having papers competing with many other tracks and activities of CHI. Our new proposal will mitigate this by scheduling papers in a different part of the day that does not compete with other activities. With this approach we will have a similar expected number of paper sessions, while ensuring that these do not conflict with other important aspects of the conference experience (e.g., panels, networking, workshops, etc). People also reflected on the positives of this newly streamlined format, and the flexibility this allowed for organizing the conference. Outside of the town hall, we’ve had online discussion sessions with many community members, and individual conversations with CHI contributors.
CHI is always planning a few years ahead when we are contracting for space. As such, we’re making final decisions for CHI2026 in Barcelona, and what exact space we’re contracting for in the conference center. With that in mind and considering the feedback we received, the steering committee is moving forward with a pilot of this new format for CHI2026.
Many of the specific organizational details will be turned over to the team running CHI2026 – with more details to appear on their page including CfPs. If you have questions or comments about these changes, please add a comment to this open document.
We understand any change to something as established and large as CHI is going to come with uncertainties and challenges. That being said, we see these changes as positive for both the intellectual and financial health of the conference. We are positive the community will work with us to manage these changes and make the format productive for future generations of CHI. In classic HCI tradition, this change reflects an iterative approach. We want to understand how this approach will fare with the community as they experience CHI 2026. This is not expected to be the final outcome, but the start of a new iteration.
We invite everyone in the global HCI community to take advantage of these changes and to use this opportunity to help reimagine the conference experience for both new and established members.
Thank you to everyone who participated in the CHI post-conference survey, which was open for approximately two weeks after the conference (from May 29 to June 10). Overall, 613 people participated in the survey, representing approximately 15% of the total number of CHI attendees (3,995 in total). This compares with 17% of the total number of attendees in 2023.
This article provides a concise overview of the survey findings. The interpretations are based on a thematic analysis of the open comments (the thematic analysis was done by Caroline Appert and Simone Barbosa).
Attendees’ experiences
The following chart shows the distribution of respondents based on their type of attendance at the conference. The green bar represents respondents who attended the conference in person, while the brown bar represents those who attended virtually. Among the respondents, approximately 15% attended the conference virtually. This percentage is close to the actual virtual attendance, which was approximately 17% for CHI ‘24.
In the survey, 78 respondents shared their reasons for choosing virtual attendance over on-site attendance. These reasons are reported in the table below (respondents were allowed to select multiple reasons).
What factor(s) did influence your decision to attend the conference virtually rather than in person? ————————————————————————- | 56.41% | My decision to attend virtually was influenced by ecological reasons. | | 14.10% | My decision to attend virtually was influenced by cultural reasons. | | 03.85% | My decision to attend virtually was influenced by the Covid-19 pandemic.| | 42.31% | My decision to attend virtually was influenced by personal reasons. | | 38.46% | My decision to attend virtually was for other reasons. |
The distribution of responses to the question “How valuable was your CHI experience?” is presented below, using a breakdown by attendance type: virtual attendance on the left and on-site attendance on the right. The chart shows that on-site attendance was highly valued, mostly because it offers opportunities for networking (connecting with people and meeting new people) and for getting up-to-date with scientific content that is timely and of high quality. In contrast, feedback from virtual attendees was less positive. In their open comments, virtual participants highlighted the lack of networking and interaction opportunities (both as attendees and presenters), the fact that there was little to participate in and insufficient synchronous/hybrid interactions for the sessions they could participate in.
The survey included a series of questions where respondents rated various aspects of the conference, including sessions and activities (such as papers, demos, posters, panels, SIGs, student competitions, workshops, and keynotes) as well as conference events (such as receptions, exhibits, job fairs, and town hall meetings).
Overall, attendees gave mostly positive feedback about the sessions and activities, with all venues receiving a similar level of appreciation. However, some on-site attendees noted that activities in the exhibit hall could have been better. The most frequently mentioned issues included the lack of conviviality in the exhibit hall (quality of food and price of drinks during the reception), the perceived suboptimal poster layout for visibility and interactions, the limited number of demos during Interactivity, and the reported lifelessness of the Job Fair session. Virtual attendees, who did not experience the exhibit hall, gave consistently positive feedback across the sessions and activities they accessed. However, the low number of responses collected from virtual attendees makes it difficult to draw general conclusions.
Respondents also had the opportunity to evaluate how well different tools and aspects of the conference met their needs. This included the conference website, the Progressive Web App (PWA) used to navigate the program, and the different types of content offered by the conference, such as streamed content, recorded content, and the Sli.do application for handling questions and answers (QAs). The distribution of their responses is presented below.
Feedback regarding the PWA was mixed. Some attendees liked it, while others reported issues with getting the app to work on some mobile devices and found the navigation model confusing for such a large program. Attendees also suggested that the information on the conference website, especially instructions for presenters and remote attendees, should be better structured and clearer. Respondents mentioned that some information was included in specific blog posts that were not easy to find. To promote a better balance between remote and on-site participants, attendees were instructed to submit questions through the Sli.do app regardless of their mode of attendance. However, comments revealed that on-site attendees found this experience to be not fluid, and they quickly avoided using the app to ask questions during sessions. As a result, the appreciation of the Question and Answer experience was mixed. Finally, feedback regarding asynchronous presentations was notably negative, likely driven by the lack of interaction possibilities with pre-recorded videos.
To enable asynchronous presentations, presenters had to submit pre-recorded videos. For papers, case studies, and alt.chi presentations, the duration of these videos was capped at 15 minutes. For posters (including LBW, student competitions, and the Doctoral Consortium) and demos (Interactivity), the duration was set to 3 minutes. In the survey, we asked respondents to provide their feedback about whether these durations were suitable from both attendee and presenter viewpoints.
The charts below illustrate how well these durations aligned with what people expect either as attendees or as presenters. The large grey areas in the bars indicate that a significant proportion of attendees did not watch these videos. Regarding the duration of the videos, the trend for the 15-minute videos is that they are generally considered either appropriate or too long, while the trend for the 3-minute videos is that they are either appropriate or too short. Compared to last year, where long videos were 8–10 minutes long, a larger proportion of respondents this year mentioned that shorter videos would be preferable. In the comments, some attendees mentioned that the duration of videos should match the duration of on-site talks. As presenters, they also wish these videos to take less time to prepare and would like to receive instructions further in advance.
Accessibility
Among the respondents, approximately 2% requested an accessibility-related feature at the conference. The chart below indicates that these requests contributed to a positive experience. Very few accessibility-related issues were reported by CHI participants in the survey. Some of the issues reported included lack of food options, lack of air-conditioned spaces or difficulty using the PWA.
Transportation
The question about local travel in Hawai’i during the conference revealed that the majority of local travel was made on foot, and by car to a lesser extent.
How did you undertake local travel in Hawai’i while attending the conference? ———————————————————- | 90.26% | On foot | | 42.69% | By car | | 03.48% | By metro (skyline) | | 02.78% | By bike | | 12.76% | Other |
Willingness to attend CHI ’25
In response to the final question on the likelihood of attending CHI ’25 in Yokohama, Japan, the majority of respondents will probably or definitely attend the conference physically, although some indicated that this would depend on the acceptance of papers or the availability of funds. The chart also illustrates that a very small number of respondents indicated that they would attend virtually, with a few stating that virtual attendance was not worth the effort.
As a final note, we would like to thank all the respondents who took the time to provide valuable feedback. We have carefully read and analyzed all the detailed comments, categorizing them into relevant themes and summarizing the key points. The input and insights shared by the attendees are very valuable to everyone involved in SIGCHI, the CHI Steering Committee, and the overall organization of CHI.
The CHI post-conference survey ran for two weeks after the conference. We closed it on May 14. Overall, 832 persons took part to the survey, accounting for approximately 17% of the total number of CHI attendees (4,722 in total). This article gives a concise overview of the survey findings. Interpretations are based on a thematic analysis conducted to analyze the responses received for the open-ended questions.
Attendees’ experiences
The following chart depicts the distribution of respondents based on their attendance at the conference. The green bar represents respondents who attended the conference in person, while the brown bar represents those who attended virtually. Among the respondents, approximately 10% attended the conference virtually. This percentage is slightly lower than the actual percentage of virtual attendance, which was approximately 17% for this year’s conference.
The distribution of responses to the question “How valuable was your CHI experience?” is presented below, according to a breakdown by attendance type: on-site attendance on the left and virtual attendance on the right. The chart shows that on-site attendance was highly valued, primarily due to the opportunities for networking and the quality of scientific content presented at the conference. In contrast, feedback from virtual attendees was less positive. Analysis of respondents’ comments revealed two main reasons for their dissatisfaction: 1) remote presenters did not receive sufficient visibility during the on-site conference, and 2) virtual attendees expressed a sense of isolation as they were unable to engage and interact with other conference participants. These factors contributed to the less positive evaluation of the CHI experience among virtual attendees, as compared to those who attended in person.
The survey included a series of questions where respondents individually rated various aspects of the conference, including sessions and activities (such as papers, demos, posters, panels, SIGs, student competitions, workshops, and keynotes) as well as conference events (such as receptions, exhibits, job fair, and town hall).
Overall, attendees provided mostly positive feedback about the sessions and activities, with all venues receiving equal appreciation from on-site attendees. However, comments from some on-site attendees highlighted the need for improvements in the organization of the poster venue. Specifically, respondents mentioned that the spatial layout of the hall can be confusing, and the program schedule too packed, leaving insufficient time for interaction with poster presenters. This issue was further reflected in a subsequent question, where 32% of respondents stated that they were unable to see or interact with some posters or demos they had intended to.
In contrast, feedback from virtual attendees was consistently negative across all venues, although some comments mentioned that certain SIGs managed the hybrid experience well. Concerns were also expressed regarding the Job Fair event, as it lacked significant engagement. Additionally, comments revealed that some attendees expected the town hall sessions to allocate more time for discussing important topics, such as the environmental costs associated with the conference location.
Respondents had the opportunity to evaluate how well different tools and aspects of the conference met their needs. This included the conference website, the Progressive Web App (PWA) used to navigate the program, as well as the different types of content offered by the conference, such as streamed content, recorded content, and on-site presentations. The distribution of their responses is presented below.
Overall, people highly appreciated the on-site sessions. However, ratings for streamed and recorded content were lower, which is likely due to the limited availability of such content. Regarding the PWA, feedback was mixed, with some attendees expressing their satisfaction with its features, while others expressed certain concerns. Usability issues that were brought up by respondents have been compiled and will be taken into account by SIGCHI to the best of their abilities.
To accommodate the hybrid format, presenters were requested to create pre-recorded videos, which has become a standard practice. For papers, case studies, and alt.chi presentations, the duration of these videos was set to 7-to-10 minutes. For posters (including LBW, student competitions, and Doctoral Consortium) and demos (Interactivity), the duration was set to 3 minutes. In the survey, we asked respondents to provide their perspective on whether these durations were suitable, considering both the attendee and presenter viewpoints.
In the charts below, the large grey areas in the bars indicate that a significant proportion of attendees did not watch these videos. This observation is particularly pronounced for poster presentations. This is not very surprising given that a majority of survey respondents attended the conference on-site. However, many comments expressed satisfaction towards these videos, emphasizing their role in facilitating asynchronous consumption of content. It is worth noting that there were some comments that highlighted the amount of work involved in producing these videos for presenters.
Regarding the duration itself, which was the primary focus of these questions, a majority of respondents assessed the current durations as suitable (indicated by the blue bar in the charts). Very few respondents expressed a preference for shorter videos (represented by the light purple bar). We can conclude that the current video durations should not be reduced.
Evolution of the selection process
The survey included a series of questions about the selection process at CHI. In particular, we were interested in the comparison between the previous system based on rebuttals and the current system based on revise and resubmit (R&R).
The first question aimed to determine the percentage of respondents who had previously submitted a research paper and their experience with each system. Notably, over 40% of the respondents had submitted papers using both systems, enabling them to provide insightful comparisons as users of both approaches.
Have you already submitted a research paper to CHI? ————————————————- | 43.06% | Yes, in both the previous system and the current system | | 20.68% | Yes, in the current system (R&R) only | | 10.73% | Yes, in the previous system (rebuttal) only | | 26.44% | No |
The charts below provide a comparison between the two systems, based on different criteria. Green bars are when rebuttals are considered better, brown bars when R&R is considered better, and grey is “no difference”.
On the first line, we consider 1) the quality of papers, 2) the quality of the dialogue between authors and reviewers and 3) the quality of reviews. Overall, the quality of the review process is perceived as better with R&R than with rebuttals.
On the second line, we can observe the drawbacks associated with R&R. Specifically, the charts illustrate how respondents assessed the workload for authors, reviewers, and Program Committee (PC) members. The large green bars indicate that, in comparison to the rebuttal system, R&R increases the workload for all participants involved in the process.
The survey concluded with a final question that aimed to assess respondents’ overall preference between the two systems. The results indicate an inclination towards the revise and resubmit (R&R) system:
Overall, what system do you prefer? ————————— | 40.72% | R&R | | 19.94% | Rebuttals | | 39.34% | No preference |
Accessibility
Among the respondents, approximately 2.79% requested an accessibility-related feature at the conference. The survey also explicitly inquired if attendees had encountered negative experiences in terms of accessibility. The chart below gives an overview of the responses, revealing that some respondents did report negative experiences.
Upon analyzing the comments provided in response to this question, the negative feedback is primarily attributed to the challenges faced by virtual attendees in interacting with the conference. Regarding experience on site, a few comments mentioned how overstimulating it can be for some individuals.
The survey included a couple of questions regarding positive experiences and suggestions for improving accessibility. Respondents provided valuable insights and mentioned several positive experiences that contributed to their overall satisfaction. Specifically, they highlighted the availability of sign language, captions for content, the presence of a quiet (desensitization) room in the conference center, and support for families (childcare).
Furthermore, respondents also provided suggestions for enhancing accessibility. In terms of virtual attendance, they want more support to interact with attendees and presenters on site and remote. As for the on-site experience, attendees expressed the desire for a wider range of food options with clear indications regarding their composition. Additionally, they would like more seating areas where they can rest and relax.
Transportation
The series of questions related to transportation revealed that approximately half of the attendees arrived by train (note though that a large proportion of respondents come from Europe). During the conference, participants either traveled on foot or took the train. This was greatly facilitated by the provision of complimentary passes for public transportation in Hamburg, which were included with the conference registration. The respondents expressed a high level of satisfaction regarding this initiative, with half of them stating that it had influenced their travel plans in some way.
How did you travel to Hamburg? (select all that apply) —————————————- | 58.08% | Plane | | 53.48% | Train | | 5.43% | Car | | 4.04% | Other |
How did you travel around Hamburg while attending the conference? ——————————————- | 82.61% | On foot | | 73.71% | By train | | 6.40% | By car | | 3.62% | By bike |
Willingness to attend CHI ’24
In response to the final question about the location of the CHI ’24 conference, we received a diverse range of opinions. When asked about the likelihood of physically attending the conference in Hawaii, respondents were divided. Approximately half of them expressed a strong interest and stated that they would like to go or were likely to attend. On the other hand, the remaining half indicated that they would not attend or would prefer to participate virtually.
In the free comments section, respondents raised several concerns regarding the conference being held in Hawaii. These concerns primarily revolved around the carbon footprint associated with long-distance travel, the time and cost involved in reaching the destination, and the potential negative impact on the local communities in Hawaii.
As a final note, we would like to thank all the respondents who took the time to provide valuable feedback. We have carefully read and analyzed all the detailed comments, categorizing them into relevant themes and summarizing the key points. The input and insights shared by the attendees are very valuable to everyone involved in SIGCHI, the CHI Steering Committee, and the overall organization of CHI.
TL;DR The CHI Steering Committee (SC) is seeking expressions of interest (self-nomination or nomination of others) for people interested in serving the CHI community in future key leadership roles: CHI conference General Chairs and Technical Program Chairs for CHI2027 or CHI 2028. Note: We expect an open call will be repeated in later years.
CHI Conference Leadership
We invite Expressions of Interest from people, or nominations of people, who are willing to take on CHI conference leadership roles of General Chair (GC) and/or Technical Program Chair (TPC) for CHI2027 and CHI2028 (CHI2026 leadership team is already in place). These roles require significant organisational involvement with prior CHI Conferences, or chairing other SIGCHI conferences, and managing significant budgets or managing the technical program of a conference.
Work in these roles is substantial. Tasks are expected to start ~2+ years prior to the appointed conference, with more intensive work in the year leading up the conference, and wrap-up tasks in the 6 months beyond the conference. See below for role-specific information.
Note: Given the scale and complexity of the CHI conference, and needing to plan multiple years in advance, the SC will have already made decisions related to geographic location and venue before the appointment of GCs and TPCs for that year. These decisions are publicly announced at the CHI two years in advance but will be shared confidentially with invited chairs as input to their decision-making on whether to accept the role or not.
General Chair
The key overall responsibilities of General Chairs include:
Create and lead a diverse team to deliver the organisational aspects for the conference
Set the overall conference direction, e.g., deciding the conference theme, attendance modality, etc., in line with the ‘Core to CHI’ policy and the strategic directions from the CHI Steering Committee
Manage the CHI conference budget in conjunction with ACM
Ensure that appropriate SIGCHI policies are adhered to in delivering the overall conference experience
Liaise with the logistics contractor (currently Executive Events) to oversee all logistical and organisational details
Work effectively with the Technical Program Chairs and other organisation committee chairs (not under TPC oversight) to deliver the conference experience
The key criteria to serve as CHI General Chair include:
Senior level or significant involvement with prior or upcoming CHI Conference Organizing Committees; and/or experience as a senior organiser of a SIGCHI-related conference and managing budgets
Regular participation in the CHI conference as an author and attendee
Ideally, support from the employer for the time needed for the role
Technical Program Chair
The key overall responsibilities for Technical Program Chairs include:
Create and lead a diverse team to deliver the technical content for the conference
Liaise with ACM to oversee the publication process
Manage the schedule and virtual content of the technical program of the conference
Manage the allocation of venue space and layouts
Ensure that appropriate regulations and procedures are adhered to in delivering the technical content
Work effectively with the General Chairs to deliver the schedule for the conference
The key criteria to serve as CHI Technical Program Chair include:
Senior level or significant involvement with prior or upcoming CHI Conference Organizing Committees; and/or significant experience in the technical program organising committee of a SIGCHI-related conference
Understanding/Willingness to learn the systems and tools used in the SIGCHI publication process: TAPS, PCS, Templates, etc.
Regular participation in the CHI conference as an author and attendee
Ideally, support from the employer for the time needed for the role.
PROCESS
Submission of Expression of Interest / Nominations:
You can nominate as an individual or as part of a GC or TPC pair, or as a combined GC and TPC team or part thereof. Each person will need to submit their own EOI and name their team partners/roles.
Expressions of Interest (EOIs) will include a short biography along with a brief statement of the specific role you are interested in, how you meet the criteria noted above, and preferred future CHI year(s) in which you would be willing to serve.
Nomination of another person should also address the same content, and in addition, make clear that the person has agreed in advance to being nominated.
The CHI Steering Committee will make the decisions about future CHI leadership teams. The EOIs will serve as one set of inputs to the decision-making process, along with other considerations, e.g., about diversity of gender, geography, institution etc, mix of expertise, and location-specific needs.
Towards this process, the SC and its SC Future Chairs and Volunteer Development Director:
Will help publicise the call for Expressions of Interest
May identify and approach potential candidates directly to assess their interest
Will review all potential candidates and Expressions of Interest
Will create a short-list for the CHI SC chair to take to the SIGCHI Executive Committee for final approval – the short-list will be based on:
Record of SIGCHI conference leadership
Record of CHI involvement
Response from the annual open calls
Suggestions gathered from SC, OC, and EC
Conference location (Note that CHI GC and TPC selections occur after the conference location has been selected. However this is still confidential until it is publicly announced at the CHI two years prior. Selections will, therefore, also be mindful of the local and diasporic communities of researchers connected to that conference location.)
Team diversity
Will make formal invitations once approved (Invited persons will be informed confidentially about the conference location to include as part of their own decision-making process)
ReviewWorking Group Co-Chairs: Regan Mandryk and Sven Mayer
TL;DR: The CHI Steering Committee is putting together a working group on peer review of full papers. There are three ways to contribute (member of the working group, expert panelist, community stakeholder) described below, with expected time commitment and responsibilities. Volunteer by July 15, 2024 at https://forms.gle/mhfCRGVWaCrZ5SZD7.
The CHI Steering Committee is forming a working group to reimagine peer review at CHI. According to our policies (https://chi.acm.org/policies-processes/working-groups-policy/), working groups are short-term committees expected to deliver on a specific mandate within a particular remit. This working group will focus on articulating challenges with the peer review process of full papers for the CHI conference and articulate proposals for changes to address these challenges. Members of the working group will engage with the community through interviews, focus groups, and surveys, and will analyze existing data held by the CHI Steering Committee. As part of our remit, this working group will establish several expert panels that will provide input from different methodological perspectives reflected in research published at CHI and groups of community stakeholders that bring specific perspectives.
Mandate: To engage with the broad CHI community on challenges and solutions for our current process of peer review of full papers at CHI. The working group is tasked with considering the following:
Articulate what is a ‘CHI paper’.
Formulate a policy and process for desk rejections and assisted desk rejections at CHI.
Provide a recommendation for whether CHI should implement the CRediT system, and if so, provide a process for inclusion into the review pipeline.
Draft policies for CHI on open review, anonymous submissions, revise and resubmit at CHI, minimum qualifications for reviewers/ACs/SCs, submission limits, paper lengths, reviewer incentives/disincentives, the use of artificial intelligence in review, inter-conference review sharing, and citational justice after discussions with the community.
Create author and reviewer resources focused on the logistical aspects of publication at CHI, including: accessibility, templates, and the proceedings pipeline.
Create reviewer resources for CHI on reviewing interdisciplinary work, and best practices for review (may be subdomain specific and ever changing, e.g., including positionality statements, asking for quantitative or intercoder reliability for qualitative work).
Manage the transition of CHI to ACM Open.
Consider the current subcommittee structure at CHI and propose changes as necessary, including the keywords used in PCS.
Consider other issues of peer review as raised by the larger community in discussions.
Remit: The working group will be concerned with full paper publications, as reviewed for and published by the CHI conference. Although there will be findings that may apply to other tracks (e.g., extended abstracts) or venues of publication (e.g., other SIGCHI conferences), and the working group will share knowledge with various stakeholders, the final report will be specific to full papers at CHI.
Timeline: The working group will conduct its activities over one year and deliver on a final report by August 2025.
Call for Volunteers
Members of the Working Group
Description: The working group (WG) will be responsible for leading the community discussions around peer review at CHI, will analyze data related to full papers at CHI, will generate proposals for changes, and will gather feedback on these proposals. The WG will aim to reflect the diversity of the CHI community, in terms of geography, epistemology, identity, career stage, and career type.
Expertise: We expect members of the working group to have significant expertise in terms of peer review of full papers at the CHI conference, either as paper chair, technical program chair, or paper subcommittee chair and to have published full papers at multiple CHI conferences.
Expectations of Contribution:
Analyze data from PCS and surveys gathered by CHI Steering Committee
Gather knowledge from other research communities in peer review practices and challenges
Design and deploy surveys to larger CHI Community
Process survey data and distill findings
Conduct interviews and focus groups with expert panels
Lead community sessions with various stakeholder groups
Propose new plans and articulate them in blog posts
Time commitment: Twice monthly meetings for one year with additional workload when focus groups and interviews are being conducted and interpreted
Members of the Expert Panels
Description: We will have multiple expert panels that reflect the methodological diversity of research approaches in the CHI conference. The members of the expert panels will provide specific knowledge related to gold standards of evaluation for a method, problems of evaluating research contributions using this method, and potential solutions for addressing problems within peer review. Across the expert panels, we aim to reflect the diversity of the CHI community, in terms of geography, epistemology, domain, methodological approach, identity, career stage, and career type.
Expertise: We expect that members of the expert panels will have experience reviewing for and publishing full papers at CHI. Further, we expect that expert panelists will have served as an Associate Chair for one of the CHI subcommittees.
Expectations of Contribution:
Participate in interviews and focus groups with WG
Edit survey questions and provide input on interpretation of findings
Provide feedback on proposed changes to peer review at CHI
Recruit input from community members on proposed changes
Time commitment: 6–8 meetings over a 12-month time frame
In addition, each expert panel will have a chair, who will be the lead point of contact for that group.
Community Stakeholders
Description: There are various community stakeholders who may wish to represent their perspectives to the WG and expert panels in a deeper way than participating in community sessions or providing survey data. These stakeholders could be related to career type, stage, identity, geography, or other perspectives that we haven’t yet considered.
Expertise: We expect that community stakeholders are part of the SIGCHI community, and have published and reviewed full papers at CHI.
Expectations of Contribution:
Participate in interviews and focus groups with WG
Provide feedback on proposed changes
Time commitment: 2–3 meetings over a 12-month time frame
To Volunteer
Please fill out the volunteer form at https://forms.gle/mhfCRGVWaCrZ5SZD7 by July 15, 2024. We will get back to all volunteers by August 15, 2024.
Authors: Regan Mandryk and Caroline Appert, with support from Anna Cox, Geraldine Fitzpatrick, Katherine Isbister, Marta Cecchinato, Simone Barbosa, Cliff Lampe, Aaron Quigley, and the entire CHI Steering Committee.
Purpose of this blog post: We present the format changes planned for the CHI conference, moving forward, beginning after CHI 2025. Many of these format changes were also financially motivated, and we will justify those decisions throughout.
TL;DR: The CHI Conference will move in a future year to a 5-day event (Monday to Friday) that will provide paper sessions in one half of the day, and interactive content (in five tracks) in the other half of the day. Exhibitor booths will be replaced with other formats for sponsor engagement.
Our starting point for discussion of the conference format changes was driven by two main factors: finances and format (see Parts One, Two, and Three of the blog posts for details). To summarize these, the CHI conference has made significant budget cuts over the last decade by removing services and turning to volunteer and author labour that has a cost to our community and volunteers; additional budget cuts require removing conference elements. Beyond the financial issues, the format of CHI keeps scaling to accommodate our growth—we keep adding parallel tracks, resulting in a bloated, overwhelming, and difficult to navigate program with little structured networking time or time for discussion of content or ideas—we have lost the ‘confer’ part of our conference.
Our solution is to spend half of the day learning about the state of the art in HCI through paper presentations of refereed content. In the other half of the day, we construct the future together through interactive content (e.g., workshops, SIGs, panels, roundtables, provocations, mentoring events, student competition venues, other discussion formats, and posters)—venues that would be reviewed1. This would have the benefits of increasingtime available for conferring in structured formats and also increasing the time for discussion around each paper. However, we would necessarily decrease the time in the schedule devoted to paper talks. At our January meeting, the CHI Steering Committee voted in favour of the following motions:
Proposal 1: CHI moves to five days from Monday to Friday.
By removing the weekend program, we reduce the cost of the venue rental. By leaving half of the day for interactive content, we move the nature of the pre-conference interactive events (e.g., workshops, doctoral consortium) into the main conference program.
Proposal 2: CHI removes schedule conflicts between paper sessions and all other sessions
We devote half of each day to paper presentations, allowing both for greater parallelization and supporting attendees in not having to choose between seeing the paper presentations and attending the interactive elements (e.g., panels, posters) that are harder to access after the conference. This also promotes discussions as a result of seeing the state-of-the-art content.
Proposal 3: CHI non-paper contributions are bundled into five flexible conference experiences (i.e., workshops, panels, meet-ups, extended abstracts, interactive demonstrations) that focus on building community and co-creating the future of the field.
In the other half of the day, there are a variety of structured networking events that support people at various career stages to access and contribute to the CHI conference in myriad ways. These interactive events are bundled to better streamline the conference program, reducing bloat, supporting a smaller organizing committee, and reducing the amount of needed professional organizing support, which is one of our major budget line items. We describe each of these tracks below, and also provide example CFPs for each track in this google doc.
Proposal 4: CHI sunsets exhibitor booths, but provides new opportunities for sponsor engagement (e.g., invited talks).
By removing the exhibitor booths, we expect that we will see major savings to the budget. It is true that exhibitors paid for booths; however, the cost of building the booths, powering them, paying professional staff to manage them, and paying for the venue space to house them greatly outweighed the revenue collected by exhibitors. These have been a financial loss to CHI; however, they have been a key part of the CHI coffee break experience and it will be sad to see them go. Doing so will, however, open the option for booking CHI in large hotels (or hotel clusters) as opposed to convention centres, which can be significantly more cost effective, and also opens new possibilities for different cities and countries to host CHI. To replace the industry engagement generated by the booths, CHI will turn to sponsor talks—which have proven to be very popular in the last few years—and will also innovate new ways of highlighting our relationship with industry partners.
Proposal 5: CHI redesigns the career development opportunities for doctoral students and early career researchers to be more inclusive.
One of the ways in which we want to improve the CHI experience is to provide better, more inclusive and accessible career development opportunities for doctoral students and early career researchers. The CHI doctoral consortium has been increasingly difficult to manage with a growing, diverse field, and can only be accessed by a small number of students each year. Instead, we plan to offer a range of more inclusive programming for students and early career researchers through the workshops, panels, and meet-up formats.
Proposal 6: CHI retains the student research competition in a format that meets the requirements of the ACM.
Although the other student competitions will no longer be offered, we are committed to continuing with the student research competition (SRC), as our winners attend the ACM-wide SRC and represent the field of HCI in the larger field of computing. The SRC will continue, and will be integrated into the Extended Abstracts track of CHI.
Proposal 7: That the CHI SC moves to multi-year balanced conference budget planning.
If you have read our previous posts on finances and our post on site selection at CHI, you will know that conference budgeting varies dramatically between North America and the rest of the world. This financial cost is why the CHI conference had a standard rotation of East Coast North America, Europe, West Coast North America, Asia, Wildcard until 2022. While in North America, CHI conferences could ‘save’ money that could be ‘invested’ into locations in which venues are more expensive. In 2022, the rotation was changed to be North America, Asia, Europe, Wildcard to better reflect the geographical location of CHI attendees and widen participation for attendees from a range of locations.
To give an idea of a typical CHI conference program, please see the “A Day at CHI” figure. Opening and closing keynotes will still be present (Monday morning and Friday afternoon), as will the conference reception (Monday evening). Papers are given in the mornings, and afternoons are devoted to the interactive events. In the afternoon, there is an extra long coffee break in which authors of extended abstracts will present their work as posters. Additionally, poster presenters will be given the opportunity to participate in the poster lightning talk session, in which they are given 30–60 seconds to pitch their poster to attendees. Interactive demonstrations will take place both during the conference reception and potentially during the coffee breaks.
Descriptions of the Interactive Tracks at CHI
Each of these contribution types require a submission in PCS, are reviewed—not refereed (meaning that they can be developed into archival contributions in the future), and are included in the CHI Companion Proceedings in the ACM Digital Library.
A Workshop at CHI is a structured event aimed at communal knowledge creation, typically lasting for a half day during conference days. Workshops may take various formats, such as mini-symposia, interactive co-construction sessions, structured discussions, or instructional courses, and rely on contributions from participants before or during the event to foster discussion and synthesis of ideas.
A Meet-up at CHI facilitates informal discussions among attendees with shared interests, lasting for 90 minutes and providing a platform for dialogue and collaboration. Unlike workshops, meet-ups do not require predefined contributions from participants, focusing instead on fostering discussion, exchanging opinions, and questioning ideas.
A Panel at CHI serves as an interactive forum for discussing topics of broad interest within the CHI community, featuring panelists and a moderator to encourage audience engagement. Panels differ from workshops and meet-ups in their structured format, typically involving presentations by one or more panelists and moderated discussions aimed at eliciting audience participation and dialogue.
An Extended Abstract is a short written contribution that provides attendees with an opportunity to present new and exciting contributions that showcase innovative technologies, extend prior research conversations, detail short self-contained studies, or provide provocations for new work and ideas to emerge. Extended Abstracts will be presented both in lightning sessions and as posters in a dedicated slot in the conference program.
An Interactive Demonstration is a live demonstration on-site at CHI. The Interactive Demonstrations track is for hands-on installations to share novel interactive technologies, and stage interactive experiences. As the Interactivity track focuses on the in-person experience, it is allowed to submit work that has previously been presented as papers, as long as the demonstration adds a new and unique aspect to the experience.
For those interested in the details, we provide a detailed description of each of the tracks in this sample CFP document. Note that these are not the actual CFPs for future iterations of the conference, but are working documents used to identify problems and a timeline, that will be provided to future CHI conference organizers to work from.
What about my Favourite Track that no Longer has a Name?
Case Studies
Case studies no longer exist as their own track. However, we encourage authors to submit case studies to the conference as either a Full Paper or an Extended Abstract. Community members could also organize a Workshop for case study presentations.
Courses
Courses no longer exist as their own track. However we encourage authors to submit courses to the conference in the Workshops track.
Doctoral Consortium
The doctoral consortium no longer exists as its own track. However we encourage students to submit descriptions of work in progress to the conference in the Extended Abstracts track. The CHI conference will continue to support doctoral students in their career development through the provision of relevant Workshops that specifically address career development for PhD students. We encourage doctoral students to apply to take part in the relevant workshop.
alt.CHI
The alt.CHI becomes integrated into the main program, rather than existing as a separate track. We encourage authors to submit speculative and provocative work to the conference in the Full Papers and Extended Abstract tracks. We also welcome proposals for Workshops, Meet-Ups, and Panels that center on provocations and speculative work.
SIGS
The SIGS track has been subsumed into the new Meet-Ups track.
Late Breaking Work
The Late Breaking Work track no longer exists as its own track. It has been subsumed into the Extended Abstracts track.
Student Game Competition
The Student Game competition no longer exists as its own track. Submissions of research related to human-game interaction can be submitted to the Full Papers track and the Extended Abstracts track as appropriate to the size of the contribution being made. We also welcome proposals for Meet-Ups and Workshops on related topics. For researchers who wish to provide interactive experiences of their games, please submit to the Interactivity track.
Student Design Competition
The Student Design Competition no longer exists as its own track. Descriptions of design research can be submitted to the Full Papers track and the Extended Abstracts track as appropriate to the size of the contribution being made. We also welcome proposals for Meet-Ups and Workshops on related design topics.
Video Showcase
The Video Showcase no longer exists as its own track. Videos can be submitted as supplementary materials for all tracks, and may be required when submitting to Interactivity.
Interactivity
The Interactivity track has been renamed into the Interactive Demo track.
Process that Generated the Proposals
In Conference Finances and Format—Part One: Prior and Current Context, we described the financial and format constraints of CHI. In Part Two: Shaping the Future of CHI, we articulated several proposals to address those constraints. In Part Three: Insights from the Community, we presented the findings from our survey and two community sessions that we conducted over zoom. In January, 2024, the CHI Steering Committee met over three days to consider the community feedback of our proposals, and to design a new format for CHI that would be both financially self-sustaining, and would provide more structured discussion time at the conference itself. In this blog post, we present the format changes planned for the CHI conference, moving forward, beginning after CHI 2025. Not all of these changes will be integrated as early as 2026, as planning for that conference is already underway by general chairs and technical program chairs, and we want to have time to gather community feedback on these proposals. In future posts, we will present a five-year budget model for a financially sustainable CHI conference, and a proposal for formalizing virtual CHI—an annual online conference that will also be proposed to begin after 2025.
Closing Thoughts
We understand that change is sometimes difficult or even unwelcome. We are also keenly aware (from our conversations and our survey data) that different aspects of the CHI conference program are the favourite part of CHI for a subset of our community. However, as with most institutions, it is easier to keep adding things to the CHI program, and harder to remove elements. We are at a point where it is no longer sustainable—for financial and experiential reasons and to be able to continue to manage the program with volunteers. We need to streamline the conference experience to ensure that we are providing a valuable experience for attendees that is worth the cost of registration and travel, and that is a responsible choice in the face of the carbon costs of air travel, and that responsibly manages the efforts of our volunteers.
If you have thoughts, we invite you to share them with us. You can join us at CHI 24, when we will have a community panel on the topic (tentatively scheduled for the session preceding the town hall). We will host an online community session after the CHI 24 conference. You can also reach out to any member of the CHI Steering Committee and share your feedback. We look forward to discussing these format changes with you and presenting a revitalized CHI conference experience in the very near future!
Note that these tracks would be ‘reviewed’ by the ACM’s definition. ACM considers refereed and formally-reviewed material to meet the requirements of rigorous peer-review suitable for archival publications. As the tracks other than full papers are reviewed, it would not prevent future publication of those works in an archival venue. Also note that ‘reviewing’ differs from refereeing in that there need not be written reports and statements for record. ↩︎
In Conference Finances and Format—Part One: Prior and Current Context, we described the financial and format constraints of CHI. Given those constraints, it is the CHI Steering Committee’s (SC) responsibility to evolve the CHI conference to offer a model that is both financially self-sustaining that allows for a better attendee experience with time for structured discussion and conferring.
In Part Two: Shaping the Future of CHI, we explored ways to address those constraints. In order to open the discussion with the community and assess the changes that the community is willing to make, we asked the community to comment on those proposals through both a survey and two Zoom sessions on shaping the future of CHI.
This blog post reports on the observations that we made.
Over the two Zoom sessions, there were approximately 50 participants, primarily attending from North America, Europe, South America, Asia, and Australia. In the sessions members of the CHI SC gave a presentation of the history and current situation regarding the format and finances of CHI, and then described a series of proposed changes, asking for community feedback after each proposal. Finally, a time was allocated for asking for new ideas on addressing the challenges facing the CHI conference series.
Overall, 323 persons took part in the survey. When interpreting the results reported below, it is important to keep in mind that this sample is relatively small in comparison with the community size (4,722 attendees for CHI ‘23). The geographic distribution of respondents and their CHI experience are reported in the two charts below. As 17 respondents stated not having yet attended a CHI conference, they were excluded from the subsequent analysis.
Alt Text: Charts of locations of respondents and how many conferences they have attended. There were 151 from Europe, 91 from North America, 59 left their country blank, 13 from Asia & Pacific, 6 from South or Latin America, 1 from Africa, 1 from MENA. In terms of previous CHI attendance, 52 had attended 10+, 4–9=100, 2–3=82, 1=37, 0=17, and 35 left it blank.
The survey consisted of a series of proposals, each aligning with one the following three objectives: 1) increase participants’ time for conferring, 2) reduce the conference expenses or 3) increase the conference revenue. Survey participants were requested to express their level of support for each proposal by assigning a score between 0 (No support) and 10 (Full support). Respondents were also systematically invited to share open comments. In all charts below, the median (M) is used as a central measure of respondents’ scores.
1. Increase the time for conferring
1a. By changing the presentation format
Proposal: All papers give lightning talks, followed by parallelized discussion time in a ‘scrum’ format.
As illustrated above, respondents’ scores to this proposal were quite uniformly distributed over the full [0-10] range. In their open comments, respondents feared that the talks might become too short, resulting in a format that might be stressful for non-native English speakers who might need more time to convey important messages and some difficulties for attendees to absorb enough substantial content. Also note that we did not suggest a specific duration for the lightning talks, so participants’ assumptions about that may have increased the variability of their responses. In the Zoom sessions, participants were supportive of this proposal, but echoed concerns about the different type of ‘performance’ required in a short well-produced lightning talk.
1b. By increasing the parallelization of the talks.
Proposal: We increase parallelization of the talks.
With a median of 4 and a distribution skewed towards more negative reactions than positive ones, we can infer that CHI has reached a level of parallelization that should not continue to increase. The detailed proposal suggested doubling the number of parallel sessions, which stirred some apprehension among respondents who deemed such an increase as unsustainable. Despite this, some respondents explicitly expressed a preference for this option over one where not all authors would have sufficient time to present at the conference. In the Zoom session, some participants noted that they had attended large conferences with highly parallel small paper sessions, and that the experience was not enjoyable for the presenters.
1c. By decreasing the number of presentations
The survey made a series of proposals that would decrease the number of presentations at the conference:
Proposal: We present only the top 5%–10% of papers as talks.
The other 90%-95% of the papers would be available to attendees either 1) as pre-recorded videos only or 2) as pre-recorded videos + posters.
Presenting the large majority of papers as videos only (Left) was very unpopular, with respondents being concerned about the almost zero value for authors to attend the conference. The possibility of complementing the video by a poster (Right) was slightly better perceived but raised concerns regarding the additional work it represents for authors for a limited exposure at the conference. But, most importantly, these two proposals caused negative reactions due to concerns related to the selection process of these “top papers” and the elitist atmosphere it would create at the conference. In the Zoom sessions, participants were also concerned about selection mechanisms for what would be considered as the “top papers”.
Proposal: We could accept only the top 5%–10% of papers as talks.
This even more radical proposal that would consist in drastically decreasing the acceptance rate was strongly rejected. Respondents argued that adopting an exceedingly low acceptance rate would introduce a considerable degree of randomness and inequities into the selection process. Respondents estimate that the selection would be decorrelated from the scientific quality of papers and would inherently reduce the diversity in papers accepted at CHI. Participants in the Zoom sessions were concerned about the effects on career development for more junior academics.
Proposal: We could limit the presentations by limiting the number of submissions per author or by instituting a submission fee.
Although limiting the number of submissions per author (Left) was assessed slightly positively per respondents, the comments highlighted the risk of such a proposal to be unfair and potentially toxic for students in large groups and the difficulty of defining a criterion to define the limit. Instituting a submission fee (Right) was largely rejected by respondents mostly because of the equity concerns it would generate between well-funded groups and less well-funded groups.
2. Reducing expenses
2a. By removing exhibitors
Proposal: Remove the exhibitors
While a few respondents acknowledged that exhibitor booths might facilitate connections for young researchers with companies, a majority of respondents’ comments pointed at the limitations of an exhibit hall as an effective platform for companies to recruit researchers. The concerns raised also included the predominantly US-centric representation of companies and the perception that corporate interests often do not align with advancing scientific knowledge, which should remain the driving force of CHI. Participants in the Zoom sessions noted that exhibitor booths are not the only means of engaging with companies at CHI.
2b. By removing or reducing interactivity
Proposal: Remove or Reduce Interactivity
In general, respondents perceive Interactivity as a fundamental aspect of CHI, considering it an indispensable platform for engaging with cutting-edge technologies. Consequently, there was a tendency to dismiss the idea of eliminating the Interactivity venue altogether (Left). Instead, respondents leaned towards the proposal to scale down Interactivity (Right), advocating for a refinement of the curation process. Some respondents also suggested potentially showcasing fewer works through several sessions in smaller rooms. Participants in the Zoom sessions agreed.
2c. By reducing our geographical diversity
Proposal: Move to a new format in which either: 1) we meet physically every 2 years and virtually in between or 2) we rotate CHI around 2-4 known locations.
Respondents acknowledged the positive aspect of reducing our carbon footprint by having virtual CHI conferences every two years (Left). However, they also expressed concerns regarding the potential impact on students’ careers. Virtual conferences, compared to physical ones, were perceived as less efficient for students to present their work and engage with an international audience. This would be particularly detrimental to students in countries where PhD programs are limited to 3 years. The shift to a virtual format every two years could mean that such students would have only a single opportunity for such valuable exposure during their PhD. Regarding the proposal to rotate CHI around 2-4 established locations (Right), respondents’ scores were quite uniformly distributed and rather neutral on average. While it could be more practical if the locations are strategically chosen to facilitate access and create as less friction as possible (regarding e.g., visa concerns), it would privilege the same regions repeatedly. Numerous respondents advocated for a more dynamic approach, emphasizing the importance of regularly exploring new locations and periodically reassessing and diversifying venues over the long term. In the Zoom sessions, participants raised the possibility of regional meetups for people who live in areas in which there is more possibility for idea exchange in HCI, but also noted that many CHI attendees live and work in areas in which geography or lack of density in HCI researchers make this challenging. They further noted that it would reduce their opportunities to meet internationally with colleagues in their specific subdomain of HCI.
3. Increasing revenue
3a. By charging a submission fee or presentation fee
Proposal: Charge a submission fee and/or a presentation fee.
These two proposals were largely rejected by respondents, with a lot of comments raising the risk of increasing inequities. Respondents also mentioned that, if implemented, stringent criteria should be meticulously crafted to grant waivers to less privileged groups. This precautionary measure aims to address the potential difficulties these fees might pose for less privileged groups to access the conference.
3b. By securing more industry sponsors
Proposal: Secure more industry sponsors.
Although this proposal was scored quite positively by respondents as it would be more money without a high impact on our current conference model, a lot of respondents adopted a cautionary tone in their comments. Participants expressed concerns about the ethical implications of a strong reliance on funding from the industry. Some emphasized the potential unreliability of this funding source, which depends on economic fluctuations. Additionally, there were comments about the high pressure it could place on CHI organizers to secure sufficient and reliable sponsorships. In the Zoom sessions, participants representing industry noted that the landscape of sponsorship was changing in the tech industry and that shrinking budgets meant less opportunity for sponsoring academic events. Further, they noted that sponsorship often came from budgets devoted to recruiting activities, which had been frozen in an era of increasing layoffs.
3c. By stopping subsidizing student registrations
Proposal: Stop subsidizing student registrations.
The distribution of respondents’ scores is negatively skewed, reflecting a consensus on the significance of facilitating student access to the conference. Some respondents mention though that a lower level of subsidization may likely not be an obstacle for students’ access overall. In the Zoom sessions, there was a lively conversation on the inequity of subsidizing discounted registrations for students from well-funded institutions by the full-price registrations of non-students from less-well-funded institutions. Furthermore, participants noted that there was too big of an incentive to cheat the system when there are large student discounts.
3d. By cutting the student volunteer (SV) program
Proposal: Cut the student volunteer program.
Respondents’ scores exhibit a balanced distribution regarding this proposal. Comments revealed that it is not clear for all that the cost of the SV program has such a significant share in the conference budget. However, as noted by many respondents, it is not clear how much could be saved by cutting the SV program altogether. SVs undertake tasks that would otherwise require contracting a vendor. Some respondents propose exploring alternatives, such as having SVs contribute a small registration fee, to reduce costs without eliminating the program. Furthermore, concerns were raised about the perceived inequality in accessibility to the SV program, with the current lottery-based selection process seen as a potential barrier for some students. In the Zoom session, participants echoed these benefits, drawbacks, and inequities of the current SV program.
Summary
We would like to thank all the respondents who took the time to provide valuable feedback, and all attendees of the two Zoom sessions who contributed thoughts. We have carefully read and analyzed all the detailed comments. All this feedback will help the Steering Committee propose a new model of CHI to the community, for further discussion and implementation as soon as 2026. Stay tuned for our suggested redesign in Part Four.
Following the Open Call in November, the CHI Steering Committee is excited to announce the following Early Career Researchers as the new members of the CHI Steering Committee:
Ignacio Avelino
Marta Cecchinato
Passant Elagroudy
Thomas Kosch
Collectively they bring significant organising committee (OC) experience through prior senior CHI service roles, including being assistants to General Chairs and Technical Program Chairs, as well as Proceedings Chair, Data Chair and Web Chair. The SC determined that this level of in-depth OC experience in key roles was the most important criteria for selection at this time, given the current critical discussions around re-thinking the finances and format of CHI (as started in the recent Open Sessions and online survey).
As further background, we were surprised and delighted to receive 36 complete Expressions of Interest. This also made the short-listing and decision making process very challenging. We had only intended to appoint 1-2 people and in the end we expanded the number of offers to join the SC to four people.
Alongside the significant OC experience noted above, the expansion to four people also enabled us to increase diversity by offering different backgrounds, gender and individual connections to different geographical regions through cultural background, prior work experience and networks in different countries.
It is exciting for the future of the CHI Conference series that so many early career researchers were interested in serving the community and shaping the future of the conference and we look forward to working together for the future of our CHI conference community.
Purpose of this blog post: In this post, we describe the future of CHI—both in terms of models for a financially self-sustaining CHI and models for a format that will allow for a better attendee experience with time for structured discussion and conferring.
In Conference Finances and Format—Part One: Prior and Current Context, we described the financial and format constraints of CHI. Please read it for details, but the takeaway message is that CHI has grown in full paper submissions much faster than in attendees. Further, no major changes have been made to the format or fee structure in a time in which paper submissions have more than quadrupled and the interest rate has risen by 43% in the USA. Each year, we make small changes by adding additional parallel tracks, reducing the length of talks, and squeezing more out of our budgets in the face of increasing expenses and stagnant revenues. Because the finances and format of CHI are intertwined, we consider these issues together.
The CHI Steering Committee (SC) has formed several working groups to consider how to address the scale, format, and finances of CHI. We have presented the situation regularly to the SIGCHI Executive Committee and have worked closely with the ACM to consider options moving forward.
Future Finances
Continuing to make budget cuts is not a viable plan for the future of the CHI conference. We have to raise revenue and decrease expenses by changing the conference format to make CHI financially self-sustaining in the future. There are some format and budget changes that we do not support (e.g., removing accessibility supports, choosing a singular inexpensive location in the USA); however, here we list some of the format changes that we could combine with a small registration hike to create a balanced budget:
We could remove the exhibitors. While this would change the face of CHI, it would also allow us to keep growing without increasing registration fees, because we would remove the exhibit hall, opening up more large hotels as site options, which can be cheaper than convention centres, and would avoid significant costs associated with exhibitor booth construction and access. However, many students and first-time attendees really value the exhibitors and attend primarily to meet potential employers from companies like Google, Microsoft, and Meta. The exhibit has provided CHI with a ‘wow factor’ that differentiates it from other academic conferences.
We could remove or reduce interactivity. Many CHI attendees state that this is their favourite part of CHI (on the post-conference surveys) and a big differentiator of CHI from other conferences. However, the program is very expensive to run in its present form. Expenses like drayage (paying people to carry boxes), shipping, electrical drops, lighting, and tables add up to a significant expense for the conference and most attendees do not even understand that CHI must pay for these fundamental supports to the interactivity showcase. Removing the track or reducing the track to a smaller form would eliminate these expenses; however, would fundamentally change what has been an integral aspect of CHI for a very long time.
We could charge a submission fee or presentation fee. This would allow us to separate out the costs of presentation and publication, while also keeping fees low. However this may privilege people from the global north or well-funded institutions.
We could move to a new format in which we met physically every other year as an international community and virtually in between. This would reduce the venue costs and allow us to earn revenue every other year, as entirely virtual conferences are significantly lower in expenses. However, it may have an impact on important networking opportunities for early career researchers and PhD students, who may only have the option to present physically at a single CHI conference during their degree. Hosting a virtual CHI by choice may also affect our ability to recruit willing volunteers into major organizational roles. Although some community members could organize regional events, this is not possible in less populated areas without a large HCI community and would privilege people in HCI-dense areas.
We could stop subsidizing student registrations. Currently, student registrations are subsidized by non-student registrations and set at no more than half the cost of a full registration, yet providing all of the conference supports to students is the same cost as for non-students. There is no rule that prevents us from changing this model. However, this may impact the ability of students to attend and grow their HCI networks, particularly if they are not from well-funded institutions or research groups.
We could cut the student volunteer program. The student volunteer program is as expensive for the conference as holding interactivity—we spend a significant amount of money (well over $200,000 per year) to keep the SV program going. However, the program provides students with valuable experience in community service and networking, and allows many to attend with reduced costs. Anecdotally, most of our conference leadership was at one point in the student volunteer program. On the other hand, the vast majority of student attendees cannot access the benefits of the SV program (due to the lottery system), so spreading the benefits more broadly around our student attendees may have more community benefits.
We could rotate CHI around 2-4 known locations. This would save the conference logistic costs and may allow us to negotiate better prices in longer-term contracts. However the choice of these locations would probably reflect past structural biases to the global north and we lose the opportunity to move the conference to new places to aid access for different parts of our community across the world.
We could expend more effort on securing industry sponsors. Some conferences gain revenue through sponsorship from major companies. CHI’s sponsorship revenue has traditionally been very small. However, increasing industry sponsorship would yield space on the exhibit floor and time in the program to sponsors in return. Further, in the post-conference survey, members of our community have expressed concerns with vetting the ethical practices of companies who wish to sponsor CHI, creating additional labour for our volunteers who coordinate sponsorships.
There are many options for the future of the CHI conference to host a valuable and meaningful event without increasing costs, but it will require new ways of thinking about why we confer and what we expect from our annual meeting. The Steering Committee is actively considering all these options in collaboration with past, present, and future CHI organizing committees. In January 2023, the CHI SC had a design session to generate a short list of possible versions of CHI that are financially self-sustaining.
The question for the community is: what aspect of CHI are you willing to change to see CHI become financially self-sustaining?
Future Format
Beyond the financial issues, the format of CHI keeps scaling to accommodate our growth, without any major redesigns. When we have too many papers, we simply add another parallel papers track (current modeling suggests this needs to happen every other year). When we have too many posters, we contract larger exhibit halls, further limiting our site selection options. This has resulted in a bloated, intense program in which attendees struggle to plan a daily schedule that allows them to see what they wish to see (according to the feedback on our post-conference surveys). Further, there is little structured networking time or time for discussion of content or ideas: we have lost the ‘confer’ part of our conference.
Based on the CHI 2030 visioning exercise, the CHI SC formed a working group in 2021 to address the scale and format of CHI. We came up with the following guiding principles for a re-imagining of the CHI conference program:
CHI provides a range of opportunities to participate and engage around content and ideas
There are diverse ways to attend and engage in meaningful ways (i.e., range of content maturity)
There are many ways to fund the ticket for attending CHI (i.e., not just through full papers)
There are ways of engaging people at all stages (i.e., students through senior leaders) and from multiple perspectives (e.g., practitioners, researchers, teachers)
2. CHI provides structured mechanisms for connecting people
The post-CHI surveys show that we continually fall short on focusing on structured mechanisms to provide networking and connection opportunities that are desired by attendees and this needs to change
3. Papers are the key element that needs to be addressed in a CHI re-design, as it’s such a huge number and one of the main constraints on venue space and program time
Too many parallel talks
Takes space away from other interactive engagement
Too much content absorption and not enough time for discussion
But papers have traditionally been the core of the CHI experience
Our program is too large to ‘curate’ sessions; we need to rely on tools for session formation
We came up with several solutions to the scale of CHI, but all of them involved not presenting all of the papers as talks. Our favoured solution involved spending half of the day learning about the state of the art in HCI through paper presentations of peer reviewed content. In the other half of the day, we construct the future together through interactive content (e.g., workshops, SIGs, panels, roundtables, provocations, mentoring events, student competition venues, other discussion formats, and posters)—venues that would be juried or curated. This would have the benefits of increasingtime available for conferring in structured formats and also increasing the time for discussion around each paper. However, we would necessarily decrease the time in the schedule devoted to paper talks. Examples of how we could reduce the number of talks include:
We could have all papers give lightning talks, followed by parallelized discussion time in a ‘scrum’ format. If we reduced all talks to lightning presentations, each accepted paper would be able to present to a larger audience through less parallelization. Then, attendees could discuss the papers asynchronously with authors in parallelized discussion scrum, allowing for greater depth in discussion. However, this makes it harder for newcomers to engage with content and does require social interaction for content access.
We could present only the top 5%–10% of papers as talks. The remaining full papers would be either presented asynchronously on YouTube or given a poster slot. However, we would need to come up with methods of determining which papers were presented as talks in an already overloaded review process. Further, we need to consider how we differentiate late-breaking work or work-in-progress posters from full paper posters.
We could accept only the top 5%–10% of papers. Other large conferences have very low acceptance rates. However, this might decrease the number of people willing to attend CHI and could affect the review process in negative ways.
We could increase parallelization of the talks. We currently have around 13 parallel tracks of paper talks at any given time. We could double this, essentially halving the audience of each paper session. However, this would make an already packed schedule even more challenging for attendees, and may make room booking impossible for technical program chairs.
We could limit the number of submissions. To return to the submission and acceptance numbers of a more manageable era, we could simply limit the number of papers that an author can submit. However, this would cause issues in large research groups in which a professor advises a number of PhD students. We could also institute a submission fee, to help authors think carefully about their submissions; however, as noted above, this might privilege individuals from well-funded institutions and research groups.
The question for the community is: what are you willing to change to increase the time available for discussion and conferring?
Continue the Conversation…
We invite you to consider this historical context, current situation, and future formats by joining us at one of two sessions in which we will work together to shape the future of CHI. We will listen to your values and concerns, and hear your ideas for the future of our conference. We will ask the hard questions about what you are willing to trade off for the parts of CHI that are most important to you. We will take what we hear in these sessions and propose several future models of CHI to the community at large, for further discussion and implementation as soon as 2026. These decisions will be in line with the CHI SC’s Vision and Values Statement.
Synchronous Sessions on Shaping the Future of CHI
You can join us at one (or both) of two zoom + miro sessions on shaping the future of CHI.
Session 1: Tuesday, December 5, 16:00 UTC Vancouver: 08:00, New York: 11:00, Paris: 17:00, New Delhi: 21:30, Tokyo: Wed 01:00, Melbourne: Wed 03:00 (https://dateful.com/eventlink/3895171221)
Zoom link is being sent to SIGCHI members via email.
Session 2: Wednesday, Dec 6, 05:00 UTC Vancouver: Tues 21:00, New York: Tues midnight, Paris: 06:00, New Delhi: 10:30, Tokyo: 14:00, Melbourne: 16:00 (https://dateful.com/eventlink/1334330769)
Zoom link is being sent to SIGCHI members via email.
Contribute Asynchronously on Shaping the Future of CHI
