A.J. Bernheim Brush is a Senior Researcher at Microsoft Research in Redmond, Washington. A.J.’s research area is Human-Computer Interaction with a focus on Ubiquitous Computing and Computer Supported Collaboration (CSCW). A.J. is most well known for her research on technologies for families and her expertise conducting field studies of technology. Her current research focus is home automation (research.microsoft.com/homeos/). She was honored to receive a Borg Early Career Award in 2010. Her research has received 2 best paper awards and several best paper nominations. A.J. is General Co-Chair of UbiComp 2014, on the UbiComp Steering Committee, and the CRA-W board. She also serves regularly on Program Committees for many conferences including UbiComp, CHI, and CSCW.

James Scott is a researcher in the Sensors and Devices group at Microsoft Research Cambridge, UK. His research interests span a wide range of topics in ubiquitous and pervasive computing, and include novel sensors and devices, mobile interaction, rapid prototyping, wireless and mobile networking, energy management, and security and privacy. Recent relevant research includes Microsoft .NET Gadgeteer (research.microsoft.com/gadgeteer) and PreHeat (research.microsoft.com/preheat). James received his PhD from the University of Cambridge in 2002, has served on PCs for conferences including UbiComp, Pervasive and MobiSys, and is currently chair of the steering committee for ACM UbiComp.

Sarah Mennicken is a Ph.D. student advised by Elaine M. Huang at the People and Computing Lab (ZPAC) in the Department of Informatics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland. She received her M.Sc. in Computer Science at the RWTH Aachen University, Germany under the supervision of Jan Borchers. For her Ph.D. research Sarah is interested in Ubiquitous Computing in general and home automation in particular. Currently her focus lies on understanding smart homes in their everyday context, how to improve intelligibility of such technologies and how to design interfaces for more natural means of controlling them.