Ellen Simpson is a fifth year PhD candidate working with Bryan Semaan. Her research focuses on two interconnected areas of sociotechnical research, particularly in the field of social computing: (1) the everyday work and routines of people, and (2) how people draw on sociotechnical platforms in these daily interactions to inform how they engage with their identities, communities and the technical systems upon which they work. Ellen earned an MSc in Media Power and Public Affairs at Royal Holloway, University of London, and a BA in History and Political Science from the University of Vermont. Ellen completed her first two years of her doctoral program at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies before coming to the University of Colorado. Outside of academia, Ellen has written three novels and helped to create and write a popular webseries that ran for the requisite three seasons and a movie. She enjoys hiking, rock climbing, watercolor painting and crosswords.