Latest News
We launched Diddit in Feb, 2009, and we're hiring!
- "Diddit launches surprisingly addictive activity guide" - VentureBeat
- "Diddit: A Social To-Do List For Your Life" - TechCrunch
- "Diddit makes your 'bucket list' social" - CNET News
- "Diddit site launches with $5M funding" - MSN Money
I launched iCaltrain for mobile phone and iPhone in 2007 which provides mobile schedule access to thousands of Caltrain riders a day. In 2008, I introduced a native iPhone/iPod Touch version through the Apple App Store.

Mike Chen (陳彥仰)'s Research
At CHI 2008, we presented the first field study of UbiFit, a system that uses mobile phones and wearable wireless sensors to improve fitness. Our Ubicomp 2007 paper applies machine learning + wearable accelerometers to recognize free-weight exercises. Discovery Channel covered our innovation in "A Personal Trainer, in the Palm of Your Hand". (See my publication list for the full papers)
In 2007, I joined a stealth-mode startup, Ludic Labs, in San Mateo, California, founded by the founding team of Inktomi. At Intel Research Seattle, I led two mobile phone/ubicomp projects that led to publications at Ubicomp (4), MobiSys (2), UIST, HotOS, and HotMobile:
- Privacy Observant Location System (POLS), a client-side GSM/WiFi location system
- MyExperience, a system for in-situ tracing and capturing of user feedback on mobile phones.
My mobile phone research focuses on rapid development of context-enhanced apps on cell phones and novel uses of personal context such as location, physical activities (e.g. running, cycling), and communication (e.g. phone calls, email, SMS).
- MyExperience: context-enhanced in-situ survey on mobile devices.
- MyRoute: personalizing directions based on personal travel patterns.
- Voting with Your Feet: inferring place preference based on visit patterns.
- Metropolitan-scale client-side positioning using GSM phones

During my years at UC Berkeley, my advisor was Prof. Eric Brewer, co-founder of Inktomi. I also worked closely with Prof. Dave Patterson, currently the ACM President, Prof. Armando Fox, and Prof. Marti Hearst on the following projects:
Professional Activities
- Executive Vice President, Monte Jade Science and Technology Association - Asia American Chapter (MJAA), 2008-2009
- Panel speaker, Mobisys 2007: "Cell Phones as a Research Platform: Opportunities and Pitfalls" - San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Program committee, USENIX 2006 - Boston, MA
- Program co-chair, CHI 2003 workshop "System Administrators are Users, Too: Designing Workspaces for Managing Internet-scale Systems" - Fort Lauderdale, FL
vCard
firstname@ludic-labs.com
Education
- Ph.D. - UC Berkeley
- Management of Technology Certificate - Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
- M. Sc. - UC Berkeley
- B. Sc. - Univ. of British Columbia, Canada
