Bill Allison (@bill_allison)
Editorial Director
The Sunlight Foundation
Bill Allison is the Editorial Director at the Sunlight Foundation. A veteran investigative journalist and editor for nonprofit media, Bill worked for the Center for Public Integrity for nine years, where he co-authored “The Cheating of America” with Charles Lewis, was senior editor of “The Buying of the President 2000” and co-editor of the New York Times bestseller “The Buying of the President 2004”. He edited projects on topics ranging from the role of international arms smugglers and private military companies in failing states around the world to the rise of section 527 organizations in American politics. Prior to joining the Center, Bill worked for eight years for The Philadelphia Inquirer—the last two as researcher for Pulitzer Prize-winning reporters Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele.
Kevin Anderson (@kevglobal)
Freelance Journalist and Editor
Kevin Anderson is a freelance journalist and digital strategist with more than a decade of experience with the BBC and the Guardian. He has been a digital journalist since 1996 with experience in radio, television, print and the web. From 2009-2010, he was the digital research editor at The Guardian where he focused on evaluating and adapting digital innovations to support The Guardian’s world-class journalism. He joined The Guardian in September 2006 as their first blogs editor after eight years with the BBC working across the web, television and radio. He joined the BBC in 1998 to become their first online journalist outside of the UK, working as the Washington correspondent for BBCNews.com. In 2010, he took a buyout from The Guardian to pursue his own journalism projects.
David Ardia (@citmedialaw)
Director
Online Media Legal Network at Harvard’s Berkman Center
David Ardia is the Director of the Citizen Media Law Project and Online Media Legal Network at Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Prior to founding the Citizen Media Law Project, David was assistant counsel at The Washington Post. Before joining The Washington Post, David practiced law at Williams & Connolly in Washington, DC, where he handled a range of intellectual property and media litigation. While at Williams & Connolly, he also performed pre-publication libel review for Newsweek, The National Enquirer, and In Touch Weekly. David is a former member of the Newspaper Association of America’s Legal Affairs Committee and Media Law Committee of the District of Columbia Bar and is a current member of the First Amendment and Media Litigation Committee of the American Bar Association and the New England Media Lawyers Group.
Tim Armstrong
Chief Executive Officer and Chairman
AOL
Tim Armstrong is responsible for setting strategy and overseeing the businesses and day-to-day operations of the company. He joined AOL in March 2009 from Google, where he served as the President of The Americas Operations, overseeing its North American and Latin American advertising sales, marketing, and operations teams. His tenure covered the scaled launch of its advertising efforts as well as defining many of the operating structures that supported the growth of its global expansion. Tim was the Vice President of Sales and Strategic Partnerships at Snowball.com, and served as the Director of Integrated Sales and Marketing at Starwave’s and Disney’s ABC/ESPN Internet Ventures. He started his career by co-founding and running a newspaper based in Boston before joining IDG to launch its first consumer Internet magazine, I-Way.
Raney Aronson-Rath
Senior Producer
Frontline
As senior producer for PBS’ flagship public affairs documentary series FRONTLINE, Raney Aronson-Rath guides the editorial development and execution of the series’ primetime television broadcasts and new media projects. With Executive Producer David Fanning, she oversees all phases of production–from story development through post-production–and is instrumental in the daily management of the series. Since joining FRONTLINE’s staff in 2007, Aronson-Rath has supervised a number of FRONTLINE reports, including the yearlong multiplatform exploration of life in the digital age “Digital Nation,” the Emmy-nominated “Rules of Engagement,” and films on domestic health care reform, PTSD, America’s financial crisis and international bribery. She also led the series’ yearlong collaboration with ProPublica and the New Orleans Times Picayune, Law & Disorder, investigating questionable police shootings in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Prior to joining the series as senior producer, she produced and directed nine FRONTLINE and FRONTLINE/World reports.
Jeremy Ashkenas
Lead Developer
DocumentCloud
Jeremy Ashkenas is the lead developer at DocumentCloud. He created the CoffeeScript programming language, the Ruby-Processing visualization toolkit and is a two-time winner of the Sunlight Foundation’s Apps for America competition, for Know Thy Congressman and Quakespotter.
Rob Baker (@rrbaker)
Catalyst
Konpa Group (Ushahidi Haiti)
Rob Baker is catalyst and lead web developer for the Konpa Group, a consultancy formed out of the Crisis Mappers at Fletcher at Tufts University following the Haiti earthquake, using haiti.ushahidi.com to collect data and save lives. During this response he contributed code to the initial response and managed technical implementation during the transition to local partners. Rob is currently working on two major projects with Ushahdi, Inc., and was formerly the Senior Web & New Media Developer for Oxfam America.
John-Henry Barac (@johnhenry)
Founder
Barac Consulting
John-Henry was an art director at the Guardian newspaper for over a decade, and has designed a diverse array of other book covers, magazines and newspapers. Increasingly drawn to mobile internet, touch interface and the iPhone, he played a role in promoting this technology as a news platform. He left the Guardian in July 2009 to immerse himself in this emerging area, and was then invited back to design the Guardian’s first iPhone app. It launched in December 2009 and was widely praised for its usability, aesthetics and attention to detail. John-Henry now provides consultancy and design services for a number of other mobile and tablet projects which will become available in the coming months.
Emily Bell (@emilybell)
Director, Tow Centre for Digital Journalism
Columbia University
Emily Bell is the first Director of the Tow Centre for Digital Journalism at Columbia University’s School of Journalism. Before taking up the post at the Tow Centre in August 2010, she was the Director of Digital Content for Guardian News and Media in the UK and was editor-in-chief of guardian.co.uk from 2000 to 2006. She is also a columnist and blogger on trends in media and media policy.
Joe Bergantino
Founder / Director
New England Center for Investigative Reporting
Joe Bergantino is the Director and Senior Investigative Reporter of the New England Center for Investigative Reporting. He has been a national and local investigative reporter for 32 years. He spent most of his career as the I-Team Reporter for WBZ-TV in Boston. He also did investigative reporting for WPLG-TV, the Washington Post owned TV station in Miami and spent five years as a correspondent for ABC News where he reported for “World News Tonight,” “Nightline” and “Good Morning America.” During his career, Joe has won many of the broadcast industry’s most prestigious awards, including a duPont-Columbia Award and Citation, a Robert F. Kennedy Award for reporting on the disadvantaged, and a Gabriel Award. He has won several local Emmy awards, including one designating him Best Investigative Reporter in New England. He was twice nominated for national Emmys for his work in 2002 and 2004.
Roger Black (@RogerBlack)
President
Roger Black Studio
For more than 35 years, working with magazines like Rolling Stone, for newspapers like The New York Times and web sites like Bloomberg.com, Roger Black has been developing ways to communicate content more effectively.His teams have redesigned Reader’s Digest, Esquire, The Nation (Bangkok) and the Los Angeles Times, to name a few. Last year he redesigned The Washington Post newspaper and the news web site for MIT. And he’s now putting the finishing touches on a new design for the Scientific American’s web site and magazine. This year he helped launch four new companies: Webtype, Treesaver, Ready-Media and Nomad Editions. A partner in the Font Bureau and Danilo Black, both founded in 1989, he works from a small office in New York, Roger Black Studio.
David Boraks (@davnews)
Editor
DavidsonNews.net
David Boraks has worked as a journalist for more than 30 years, and his work has appeared in newspapers, magazines, on the web and on the radio in the U.S. and abroad. He has a master’s degree from Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn., and a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. From 2001-2005, he covered the top U.S. banks for the daily American Banker in New York. In 2000, he was senior correspondent for the online news service LocalBusiness.com. At The Charlotte Observer from 1993 to 2000, his duties included tech columnist, business writer and assistant features editor. Other gigs included editing jobs at The Hartford (Conn.) Courant and The China News in Taipei; Editor-in-chief of The Cambridge (Mass.) Chronicle, and editing and reporting for The Waterbury (Conn.) Republican. David has lived in Davidson, N.C. since 1993. After a 2005-2006 sojourn in Taipei and Shanghai, he founded DavidsonNews.net, and also works part-time at Charlotte public radio station WFAE-FM.
Brian Boyer (@brianboyer)
News Applications Editor
Chicago Tribune
Brian Boyer leads the news applications team at the Chicago Tribune. Prior to studying journalism at Northwestern University, he advised startups on development methodologies and ran software teams in Chicago. Between j-school and the Trib, he made some fun stuff whilst interning at ProPublica.
Jim Brady (@jimbradysp)
General Manager
TBD
Jim Brady is the general manager of TBD, a new local digital and broadcast news operation dedicated to the Washington, D.C. region. TBD is seeking to create a news site for the Web generation, one rooted in traditional journalism values, but also heavy in community engagement, aggregation, mobile and geo-personalization. He joined TBD after more than four years as executive editor of washingtonpost.com, where he led the site to numerous awards and accolades.
Mark Briggs (@markbriggs)
Director of Digital Media
King 5 TV
Mark is currently the Director of Digital Media at King 5 TV in Seattle and a Ford Fellow in Entrepreneurial Journalism at the Poynter Institute. He is also and co-founder of Serra Media, a Seattle-based technology company serving connects local publishers, and GonzoCamp, a collaborative unconference event. He is the author of “Journalism Next,” published by CQPress in December 2009, and Journalism 2.0, published by J-Lab in 2007. His next book will explore entrepreneurship in news and will be published by CQPress in early 2011. In May 2010 he was named one of 20 Journalists to Follow by Quill, the magazine of the Society of Professional Journalists. He was named to Presstime magazine’s “20 under 40” list for 2007.
Laura Brunow Miner (@lbm)
Founder
Pictory
Laura Brunow Miner is a designer, editor, and photography-lover in San Francisco. She founded pictorymag.com and phootcamp.com.
Glenn Burkins
Editor
QCityMetro.com
Glenn H. Burkins is editor and publisher of two hyperlocal sites in Charlotte, N.C. — Qcitymetro.com, a news site devoted to covering the city’s African American community, and QcityBride.com, an affiliated bridal site. Before launching Qcitymetro in 2008, he was deputy managing editor at the Charlotte Observer. He also worked as business editor there. Before joining the Observer, Glenn was White House reporter for the Wall Street Journal. He also spent four years as the Journal’s labor reporter. His career includes eight years at the Philadelphia Inquirer, where he was a business columnist and later Africa correspondent based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Glenn began his career at the St. Petersburg Times covering Florida tourism and other business topics. He has a degree in Journalism from the University of South Carolina and lives in Charlotte.
Steve Buttry (@stevebuttry)
Director of Community Engagement
TBD
Steve Buttry is a digital immigrant with fond memories of his print homeland but no plans to return, except for occasional visits. He is Director of Community Engagement for TBD, an online news operation that launched in August 2010, covering local news in the Washington metro area. He has been an editor, reporter, writing coach, blogger, innovation coach and Twitter evangelist for seven community and metro newspapers, most recently Editor of The Gazette in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He was named Editor of the Year in 2010 by Editor & Publisher magazine. He spent three years doing research, teaching and writing for the American Press Institute. He has pursued his journalism career in 43 states, eight Canadian provinces, Ireland, Venezuela, Mexico, Germany, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Ecuador and Siberia.
Sean Carlson
Manager of Global Communications & Public Affairs
Google
Sean Carlson leads Search communications for Google on the East Coast. Covering online maps, automatic translation, regional search patterns, and more, he delivers frequent training sessions for journalists in newsrooms and at conferences across the country. Now based in New York City, Sean previously worked at Google’s Mountain View, Ca. headquarters and has also managed initiatives in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific. Prior to joining Google in 2006, Sean interned with the Consulate-General of Ireland in Sydney and Fleishman-Hillard in Boston. He graduated from Boston University with degrees in political science and communication.
Tim Carlson
Manager, Digital Content Services & Platforms
USA TODAY
Tim Carlson has worked for USA TODAY for over five years wearing many unofficial hats along the way (Project Manager, QA Tester, Product Manager and Business Strategist, to name a few). Most recently, Tim has been working hard developing several USA TODAY APIs and building out the accompanying Developer Portal at developer.usatoday.com. Tim has also been a key member of USA TODAY’s mobile app development team helping to build, power and maintain their iPhone, iPad and Android apps.
Dana Chinn (@danachinn)
Lecturer
USC Annenberg School of Journalism
Dana Chinn is a full-time faculty member at the USC Annenberg School of Journalism who helps journalists and others who have content- and mission-based sites understand how web analytics can be used to build and retain audiences. Her blog, News Numbers, focuses on applying best practices in e-commerce web analytics to the news industry. At USC Annenberg she teaches modules on web analytics and news business models. She also heads the USC Annenberg-Marshall-Viterbi News Entrepreneur Fellowship Program, which brings journalism, business and engineering students together with news organizations to develop ideas for mobile devices. Before she came to USC she worked in online, strategic planning, market research and finance at media companies such as Gannett and the Los Angeles Times. She has a bachelor’s degree in Print Journalism from USC Annenberg and a master’s from the USC Marshall School of Business.
Daniel Choi (@danchoi)
Daniel Choi is a software developer based in Cambridge, Mass. He has written software for Harvard University, several Boston startups, the Democratic National Committee, and the Public Radio Exchange, a nonprofit headquartered in Harvard Square. He also develops his own web and mobile software projects, including InstantWatcher.com.
Laura Cochran (@wplauracochran)
Content Manager
Gannett
Laura Cochran is a content manager at Gannett. In her current role, she uses innovation methods, including human-centered design, to determine consumer needs, which inform new product development. This audience-first approach positions Gannett to take full advantage of emerging technologies and consumer behaviors. These insights also inform new business opportunities, building on existing content created by Gannett’s network of local and national media properties.
David Cohn (@digidave)
Founder
Spot.Us
David is an open book. Learn about him at blog.digidave.org. His most recent project can be found at www.spot.us. His career has been focused on making journalism more participatory and transparent.
Kathryn Corrick (@kcorrick)
Digital Media Consultant, ONA UK Chair
A decade of digital media experience has seen Kathryn make important contributions to the likes of McCann Erickson, Digital Britain, New Statesman magazine and the Technology Strategy Board. As well as being an independent communications consultant, Kathryn is a visiting lecturer in online journalism and a trainer in digital media. She is a member of Women in Journalism and chair of the ONA in the UK. Currently she is very excited about the possibilities of open data and is working with the Open Knowledge Foundation on their UK government spending data project Where Does My Money Go?
Jim Cutie
Chief Operating Officer
CT Mirror
Jim Cutie serves as the chief operating officer of the Connecticut Mirror. Jim’s primary responsibilities are to assure long-term sustainability and identify other potential partners and opportunities for growth. He has 35 years of general management, marketing, communications and fundraising experience in traditional and online media, including The New York Times. Jim founded a media consulting firm in Connecticut in 1997 and was a partner in Plum Holdings, L.P., an early stage media venture fund.
Lucy Dalglish
Executive Director
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
Lucy A. Dalglish is the Executive Director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, a voluntary, unincorporated association of reporters and news editors dedicated to protecting the First Amendment interests of the news media. Based in Arlington, Va., the Reporters Committee has provided research, guidance and representation in major press cases in state and federal courts for 40 years. Prior to assuming the position in 2000, Dalglish was a media lawyer for almost five years in the trial department of the Minneapolis law firm of Dorsey & Whitney. From 1980 to 1993, Dalglish was a reporter and editor at the St. Paul Pioneer Press. As a reporter, she covered beats ranging from general assignment and suburbs to education and courts. During her last three years at the Pioneer Press, she served as night city editor, assistant news editor and national/foreign editor.
Kevin Davis (@KLJDavis)
CEO
Investigative News Network
Online industry veteran Kevin Davis is the first CEO of the Investigative News Network, a consortium of local and national nonprofit journalism organizations across the U.S. A digital publisher with over 16 years experience in the strategic management of electronic media businesses, Davis oversees all functions of the Network, which is based in the Los Angeles area. Among the many initiatives he manages are revenue generation, content syndication, marketing, technology and member services. Prior to taking the helm at INN, Davis led multiple digital news operations, serving as Chief Operating Officer at TheWrap.com, President and COO at Hollywood.com, and VP/General Manager at Variety.com.
Danfung Dennis
Director
Condition ONE
Danfung Dennis is a photographer, filmmaker, and entrepreneur. He is using recent advances in technology to combines the ethics, methods and aesthetics of photojournalism with the tradition of documentary filmmaking to create experiential and interactive experiences on mobile devices. He is currently shooting and directing his first feature-length documentary on the war in Afghanistan, “HELL AND BACK AGAIN,” with an expected theatrical release in 2011. He has worked closely with the Newsweek bureau in Baghdad and The New York Times bureau in Kabul as a photojournalist since 2006. With degrees in Applied Economics and Business Management from Cornell University, he has consulted small- and medium-sized businesses in Uganda and South Africa to develop their business strategies. He has been selected as 2010 PDN 30 New and Emerging Photographers to Watch, 2010 New Faces in Independent Film, and a 2010 Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Cinematography.
Jaimi Dowdell (@JaimiDowdell)
Training Director
Investigative Reporters and Editors
Jaimi Dowdell joined IRE as a training director in October 2008. Before that she was computer-assisted reporting editor at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Adam Clark Estes (@adamclarkestes)
Social News Editor
Huffington Post
Adam Clark Estes is the social news editor at the Huffington Post. Previously, he worked as the citizen journalism editor for the Huffington Post and the Huffington Post Investigative Fund. He is also the former editor of IvyGate, a blog covering the news and gossip of the Ivy League, as well as a former editor at Let’s Go Publications. He attended Harvard College where he was an editor at the Harvard Crimson and president of Current Magazine, a national student magazine partnered with Newsweek.
Liana “Li” Evans (@storyspinner)
Co-Founder / CEO
LiBeck Integrated Marketing
Liana “Li” Evans is the author of “Social Media Marketing: Engaging Strategies for Facebook, Twitter & Other Social Media” and the Co-Founder & CEO of LiBeck Integrated Marketing. With over 15 years experience in the online marketing environment, Li writes and speaks for several industry conferences and publications. Working as an Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Social Media architect for such companies as QVC, Comcast and several other well known Fortune 500 brands, Li combines her public relations, marketing and information systems knowledge to partner with her clients to successfully integrate all of their online marketing channels for successful results.
Mark Evans
Editor and Administrator
TucsonCitizen.com
Mark is the editor and administrator of TucsonCitizen.com and he writes about local and state politics and government, freedom of information and the news industry. He’s a graduate of the University of Arizona School of Journalism and a former assistant city editor of the print version of Tucson Citizen. Before that he was editor of the weekly EXPLORER newspaper for 10 years and a reporter.
Tyson Evans (@tysone)
Interface Developer
The New York Times
Tyson Evans works on the interactive news desk at The New York Times to build data-driven Web apps on deadline. Recent projects include: Room for Debate, Olympics results, New York City homicides, immigration trends, school test scores, an investigation into water pollution and a system for reader submissions. He was previously the new media design editor at the Las Vegas Sun, which won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, and volunteers with the Society for News Design, the Online News Association and the Bridget O’Brien Scholarship Foundation.
Hannah Fairfield (@hfairfield)
Graphics Director
Washington Post
Hannah Fairfield is the graphics director at The Washington Post. She was a graphics editor at The New York Times for 10 years, and taught “Graphics in the Newsroom” at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism from 2003 to 2009. She has won many awards from the Society of News Design, and was a recipient of the 2009 National Design Award for Communication Design with her colleagues at The New York Times. Her writing and graphics have also been published in the Columbia Journalism Review, Newsday, Ms. and Legal Affairs, and in a book on the visual history of 9/11. She has two master’s degrees from Columbia University.
Tom Ferrick
Senior Editor
Metropolis
Tom Ferrick is founder and senior editor of Metropolis, a news and information web site based in Philadelphia. Prior to that, Ferrick worked as a reporter, editor and columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer for 31 years and, for five years, as a reporter and bureau chief for United Press International. Ferrick’s web site, which debuted in late December, specializes in personal essays, political and public policy commentary and in-depth news and analysis.
Filipe Fortes
Co-Founder and CTO
Treesaver
Filipe Fortes is the co-founder and CTO of Treesaver, a design firm specializing in innovative reading experiences. Filipe has been working on layout technologies since 2002, when he joined Microsoft as a Program Manager on the Windows Presentation Framework team. Collaborating with the New York Times, he led the design and development of the Times Reader, the first desktop news reader with dynamic, multi-column layout usable on multiple screen sizes. Filipe left Microsoft in 2006 and started Andiso, a boutique consulting firm specializing in user interface design and development. Andiso’s past clients include Yahoo!, Bloomberg LP, BigThink, the John Templeton Foundation, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Forbes Magazine, and several early-stage startups. He holds a master’s degree in Human-Computer Interaction and a bachelor’s in Computer Science, both from Carnegie Mellon University.
Travis Fox (@travisfox)
Documentary Film Producer
PBS / Frontline
Travis Fox is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker and journalist. His distinctive web video and multimedia stories have been instrumental in establishing a new form of multimedia storytelling on the Internet. Kurt Andersen of New York Magazine calls Fox a “natural-born Web-video genius” and describes his work as “ambitious, subtle, tough, and remarkably beautiful.”
Jesse Friedman
Product Marketing Manager
Google Maps and Google Earth
Jesse Friedman helps producers, editors, and reporters in media, entertainment, and related fields around the world make beautiful and compelling uses of many of Google’s products online, on TV, and beyond. He works with Google’s Crisis Response team to distribute satellite and other data to first responders and the media, and he works on a number of side projects, including Liquid Galaxy (a multiscreen, immersive visualization chamber for Google Earth), putting Google Maps onto more airplane seatbacks, and election and demographic mapping initiatives. Originally from Oakland, Calif, Jesse studied linguistics at the University of Chicago and works out of Google’s New York offices.
Kate Gardiner is a photographer, journalist and social media professional currently based in Washington, D.C. She holds a master’s degree from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, and a bachelor’s degree in American Studies from Brandeis University. She has been writing and photographing cultural events and editorial content since 2006. Her photos have appeared all over the internet, most recently as a contributor to the PBS NewsHour’s arts and culture section, Art Beat. Her portfolios can be found online at kategardiner.com.
Andrew Geiger
Founder
CasualHoya.com
Andrew Geiger is the founder and co-editor of CasualHoya.com, a Georgetown Hoyas blog on the SBNation network. Founded in March 2009, CasualHoya.com has rapidly become the most popular Georgetown Hoyas blog in the country. Its stories are often linked on various national platforms including ESPN, CBS Sports, and Sports Illustrated. CasualHoya’s mix of leisurely commentary and serious analysis has attracted a devoted, ever growing fan base. In his “spare time” Andrew is an attorney with Allan Berger & Associates in New Orleans, where his practice focuses on the representation of plaintiffs in pharmaceutical litigation. Andrew received his undergraduate degree from Georgetown University in 1999, and his J.D. from Tulane Law School in 2002, where he served as Executive Editor of the Sports Lawyers Journal. Prior to moving to New Orleans, Andrew worked in finance in Manhattan. Andrew resides in New Orleans with his wife and puppy, Teddy, who often features prominently on the blog.
Anthony Gimino
Blogger
Wild About AZ Cats
Anthony Gimino oversees the TucsonCitizen.com Sports Network, which operates under a grant from J-Lab in its study of networked journalism, and is the Senior Editor of Lindy’s College Football Annuals. Anthony has been a sports journalist for 20 years, as a writer and editor for newspapers, magazines and the internet. He worked at the Arizona Daily Star in Tucson from 1990 to 1998, primarily as the University of Arizona football beat reporter, before moving to Tacoma, Wash., to join CBSSportsLine.com as its College Football Editor.
Brooke Gladstone
Co-Host, Managing Editor
On the Media
Brooke Gladstone is the co-host and managing editor of WNYC’s award-winning “On the Media,” distributed nationally by NPR and heard by roughly a million people weekly. In years past, Brooke also has been senior editor of NPR’s “All Things Considered” and “Weekend Edition with Scott Simon,” and reported for NPR from Russia before becoming NPR’s first media reporter in 1995. She took the helm of “On the Media” in 2001. Her graphic non-fiction media manifesto, “The Influencing Machine,” will be published by WW Norton in May, 2011.
Rich Gordon (@richgor)
Professor, Director of Digital Innovation
Medill School, Northwestern University
Rich Gordon was the first online director for the Miami Herald Publishing Co., overseeing editorial and business operations. At the Medill School of Journalism, he launched and has overseen the school’s graduate program in interactive publishing. He has also worked as a reporter, bureau chief and editor for newspapers in Virginia and Florida, where he was one of the early leaders in computer-assisted reporting.
Steve Grove
Head of News and Politics
YouTube
Steve Grove directs the news and political content strategy and programming for YouTube, where he works to connect YouTube’s vast user community directly with news organizations and political leaders. He developed the CNN/YouTube Debates, YouTube Direct (YouTube’s citizen reporting platform), and in February 2010 brought YouTube users to the White House for an exclusive interview with President Obama. Steve blogs regularly at www.citizentube.com and worked at the Boston Globe and ABC News prior to joining YouTube.
Eric Gundersen (@ericg)
President
Development Seed
Eric is the president and co-founder of Development Seed, where he leads open data projects and consults on data collection, visualization, and mapping for some of the largest international development organizations in the world. Eric works closely with the development team on projects. This spring he helped launch Data.WorldBank.org and HaitiAidMap.com, two open data sites focused on mapping data. His most recent work is around elections in Afghanistan and includes the launch of AfghanistanElectionData.org. This year his work has brought him to countries like Nigeria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Sudan.
Steve Gunn
Editor of Innovations
Charlotte Observer
Steve Gunn is the Editor for Innovations at The Charlotte Observer in North Carolina. Previously, he had worked as metro editor and projects editor for the paper. A veteran journalist, he has worked as an editor or reporter at New York Newsday and the Dallas Times Herald.
Jonathan Harris makes inspiring projects that re-imagine how humans relate to technology and to each other. Combining elements of computer science, anthropology, visual art and storytelling, his projects range from building the world’s largest time capsule (with Yahoo!) to documenting an Alaskan Eskimo whale hunt on the Arctic Ocean (with a warm hat). He is the co-creator of We Feel Fine, which continuously measures the emotional temperature of the human world through large-scale blog analysis, and has created other projects about online dating, modern mythology, anonymity, news and language. His work has also been recognized by AIGA, Ars Electronica, the state of Vermont (for which he co-designed the state quarter), Print Magazine (which named him a 2008 New Visual Artist) and The World Economic Forum (which named him a 2009 Young Global Leader). He floats between Brooklyn, N.Y., the open road and cyberspace, documenting his life with one photo a day.
Jon Hart
Member
Dow Lohnes PLLC
Jon Hart practices law in Washington, D.C., where he heads the Media and Information Technologies practice at Dow Lohnes PLLC. Jon specializes in the representation of media and technology companies on a broad range of commercial, transactional, operational, content and litigation matters. He has been representing businesses that gather and distribute news and information, sell advertising, market goods and services, and build community on the Internet for as long as there has been a commercial Internet. Jon is counsel to the Online News Association, served on the faculty of the Stanford Professional Publishing Courses from 1994 through 2008, taught in the Yale Publishing Course in 2010, and has written extensively on media and technology law. His book, “Internet Law: A Field Guide” (BNA Books), is in its sixth edition. Before entering private practice, Jon clerked for United States Circuit Judge Jerome Farris and United States District Judge Almeric Christian. He is a graduate of Middlebury College and Stanford Law School.
Lorie Hearn
Founder / Executive Director
Watchdog Institute
Lorie Hearn is executive director of the Watchdog Institute, a nonprofit investigative journalism organization based at San Diego State University. Prior to founding the institute in 2009, she was the senior editor for Metro and Watchdog Journalism at The San Diego Union-Tribune. She is an award-winning reporter and editor. She supervised the U-T Metro staff at a critical time in San Diego County history. Her reporters and editors joined the newspaper’s Washington bureau in the Pulitzer Prize-winning stories that exposed Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham. They also published more than a dozen investigations in a year on San Diego’s near-bankruptcy. Lorie was a Nieman Foundation fellow at Harvard University in 1994-95. The Watchdog Institute focuses on data-driven projects that are distributed through print, television, radio and online collaborators. She is Journalist in Residence at San Diego State University, where she co-teaches a course in Investigative Journalism.
Elaine Heinzman (@ElenaTheRican)
Assistant Producer, Weekend Edition
NPR
Elaine Heinzman has been doing some form of journalism since she was 12 years old. She’s contributed to Time Out New York, Paper, Maxim, and just about every teen magazine in existence, including some that have folded. She’s now at NPR’s Weekend Edition, where she’s produced stories about the 2010 SXSW Interactive festival and disgruntled Republican voters in southeastern Virginia just before the 2006 midterm elections, among other stories. As a member of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, she’s taught college students how to make radio for the UNITY Journalists of Color conventions since 2007 and for the CBI National College Media Convention in 2005 and 2006.
Amanda Hickman (@amandabee)
Program Director
DocumentCloud
DocumentCloud is an index of primary source documents and a tool for annotating, organizing and publishing them on the web. Amanda joined DocumentCloud from Gotham Gazette where, as the Director of Technology, she managed development of a series of games about public policy issues and built a pretty cool database of candidates for local office. She spends a lot of time thinking about journalism and civic engagement.
Rick Hirsch
Senior Editor of Multimedia
Miami Herald
Rick Hirsch is Senior Editor / Multimedia at The Miami Herald, where he has worked as a reporter and editor for 30 years. He oversees the content on The Herald’s non-print platforms, which includes news websites, its community news partner initiative, mobile sites, video news and programming and a radio news operation for the South Florida NPR affiliate, WLRN-91.3 FM. He also supervises newsroom training and recruiting.
Ben Ilfeld
Owner and COO
Sacramento Press
Ben Ilfeld co-founded Sacramento Press and formed a hyperlocal media coalition called Sacramento Local Online Advertising Network. Ben focuses on operations and sets the vision and operational processes for the online media outlet. He defines the business and technology road map for the organization and works to continually refine the “hyperlocal” model and build community. Prior to his current position, Ben founded No Snakes Agency and managed Brooklyn-based rapper/producer P.Casso. Ben also grew up in Sacramento and graduated from The University of Rochester with a bachelor’s in Economics and Political Science.
Daniel Jacobson (@daniel_jacobson)
Director of Application Development
NPR
Daniel Jacobson is the Director of Application Development for NPR Digital Media. As such, Daniel leads the development of NPR’s content management system, web site, podcasts, mobile site, APIs, and other digital products. NPR has embraced open source as being central to its digital media strategy, and the API is the strategy’s centerpiece. Daniel is also a member of the Board of Directors for the OpenID Foundation.
Katharine Jarmul (@kjam)
Design Developer
USA TODAY
Katharine specializes in open-source development and system administration for data-heavy evergreen packages with a team of designers, journalists and multimedia storytellers at USA TODAY. A Python, django, Linux and Android enthusiast, she spends her free time cheering for the Lakers and Steelers.
Mandy Jenkins (@mjenkins)
Social Media Producer
TBD
Mandy is the social media producer for TBD. Prior to her 2010 move to Washington, D.C., Mandy was the social media editor for the Cincinnati Enquirer. She has worked in online journalism her entire career so far, starting as an online news producer for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Mandy is an alum of Kent State University, where she co-founded Fusion Magazine, a publication for sexual minority issues on campus. She attended graduate school at Kent on a two-year newsroom fellowship with WKSU-FM, an NPR station in Northern Ohio. Mandy currently lives in D.C. and blogs about news media issues at ZombieJournalism.com.
David Johnson (@darthcheeta)
Asst. Professor
American University School of Communication
David Johnson is an anthrotechnologist, professor, producer, programmer, designer, stunt blogger, and online media monsterback. He’s currently infatuated with serious games as interactive documentaries.
Richard Jones
Visiting Professor and Editor
NYU Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute
Richard G. Jones is a visiting professor at New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. He also serves as editor of The Local: East Village, a blog of The New York Times that is produced in collaboration with the university. Before joining NYU, Richard was an award-winning journalist who spent 15 years as a reporter, including seven years at The Times. While at The Times, he and a colleague were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize after a year-long investigation into the failings of New Jersey’s child welfare agency. He holds a master’s degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, where he also won a Knight-Bagehot Fellowship. He is also the 2009 winner of a Scripps Howard Doctoral Fellowship at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland where he is currently a Ph.D. student.
Jonathan Kealing (@LJWJKealing)
Assistant Director of Media Strategy / News
The World Company / Lawrence Journal-World
Jonathan Kealing is a former reporter turned editor now charged with transforming a talented newsroom staff into a group of niche-based digital journalists. Mobile? Desktop? Check and check. He’s a leader on the team launching the Lawrence Journal-World’s new class of sites, starting with WellCommons.com, which integrate journalism with community publishing and social media seamlessly and side-by-side.
Kurt Lancaster (@kurtlancaster)
Professor
NAU School of Communication
Kurt Lancaster is the author of “DSLR Cinema: Crafting the Film Look with Video,” Focal Press. His short films have screened nationally and internationally. In addition, he teaches digital filmmaking and journalism at Northern Arizona University’s School of Communication. Kurt earned his Ph.D. from New York University.
Solana Larsen (@solanasaurus)
Managing Editor
Global Voices Online
Solana Larsen is a Danish-Puerto Rican journalist based in New York. She is the managing editor of Global Voices Online, an influential grassroots newsroom of bloggers and translators worldwide. She was previously an editor with OpenDemocracy.net.
Clothilde Le Coz
Washington Director
Reporters Without Borders
Clothilde Le Coz has been working for Reporters Without Borders in Paris since 2007. She graduated with a degree in Political Sciences and International Relations before moving to journalism and working for French newspaper and radios. She is now the Washington director for this organization, helping to promote press freedom and free speech around the world. In Paris, she was in charge of the Internet Freedom desk and focused on China, Iran, Egypt and Thailand. She is the free speech correspondent for Mediashift on PBS, which tracks how social media, citizen journalism and online video are changing our media world. Her role is now to get the message out for readers and politicians to be aware of the constant threat journalists and freedom of expression are submitted to in many countries.
Charles Lewis
Executive Editor
Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University
Charles Lewis is a tenured professor and the founding executive editor of the Investigative Reporting Workshop at the American University School of Communication, in Washington, D.C. A bestselling author who has founded or co-founded four nonprofit enterprises in Washington, including the Center for Public Integrity, he left a successful career as an investigative producer for ABC News and the CBS News program “60 Minutes” and began the award-winning Center, which under his leadership published roughly 300 investigative reports, including 14 books, from 1989 through 2004. In late 1997, he began the Center’s International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, the world’s first working network of 100 premier reporters in 50 countries producing content across borders. The principal author of five Center books, including national bestseller “The Buying of the President 2004,” Lewis was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 1998 and received the PEN USA First Amendment award in 2004.
Marc Lieberman (@marclieberman)
VP, Business Development
The Onion
Marc Lieberman is the Vice President of Business Development for “America’s Finest News Source,” The Onion. Previously, he was producer of their video arm, the Onion News Network. Prior to The Onion, Marc was Co-Partner at The Cavalier Film Fund, focusing on independent feature film production. His recent credits include two festival award-winning films: Associate Producer on “Adam” and Producer on “Familiar Strangers.” Purchased at Sundance 2009 by FOX Searchlight, “Adam,” features Hugh Dancy and Rose Byrne. Peace Arch Entertainment purchased “Familiar Strangers,” starring DJ Qualls and Nikki Reed, after it played the festival circuit. Marc began his entertainment industry career as an assistant to Bobby Newmyer at Outlaw Productions and before that worked in finance and business development at Intel, Macromedia and Creative Planet. Marc currently resides in New York City, is a native of Virginia, and graduate of the University of Virginia.
Gavin MacFadyen
Director
Centre for Investigative Journalism
A graduate of the London Film School, producer and director on ITV’s World in Action and BBC’s current affairs, MacFadyen produced over 40 prime-time investigations. He co-founded the Centre for Investigative Journalism in 2003 and helped found the Bureau for Investigative Journalism in London. It is the largest foundation supported non profit production house in Europe.
Alexis Madrigal (@alexismadrigal)
Co-Founder
Longshot Magazine
Alexis Madrigal is a senior editor and lead technology writer for TheAtlantic.com. A former staff writer for Wired.com, he co-founded Longshot Magazine and is the author of a forthcoming history of clean energy in America.
Mindy McAdams (@macloo)
Professor
University of Florida
Mindy McAdams is a professor at the University of Florida, where she teaches courses about online journalism. Her book “Flash Journalism: How to Create Multimedia News Packages,” was published by Focal Press/Elsevier in 2005. She has trained more than 200 journalists in multimedia skills (Miami Herald, Orlando Sentinel, Montreal Gazette, Austin American-Statesman, various state newspaper associations, the Nieman Fellows at Harvard, two National Writers Workshops, several Poynter seminars). She has conducted journalism training or given presentations in Argentina, Britain, Bulgaria, Canada, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Russia, South Africa, Switzerland, Vietnam and Thailand. As a Fulbright Scholar in 2004–05, she taught journalism in Malaysia and researched press freedom there. Before moving to Florida, she worked on the Metro desk at The Washington Post and at Time magazine in New York. In 1994, she was the first content developer at Digital Ink, The Washington Post’s first online newspaper.
Laura McGann
Assistant Editor
Nieman Journalism Lab
Laura McGann is an assistant editor at the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard University, a collaborative project trying to figure out the future of news. She was the founding managing editor, and later editor, of the nonprofit national news and politics site The Washington Independent. Before that she covered, among other things, Alaska political scandal for TPMMuckraker. She’s worked the bankruptcy beat for Dow Jones Newswires. McGann is a graduate of Northwestern University, where she completed a joint master’s degree program at the Medill School and Northwestern Law School. She lives in Cambridge, Ma., with her dog, FOIA.
Geoff McGhee (@mcgeoff)
Creative Director
Lane Center for the American West, Stanford University
A 10-year veteran of online multimedia and infographics, Geoff McGhee develops public policy oriented interactive content at Stanford University’s Bill Lane Center for the American West. He spent 2009-2010 as a John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford, doing research on data visualization. He was previously the Multimedia Editor at Le Monde Interactif in Paris, and worked at The New York Times from 2000 to 2008 as Graphics Editor, Enterprise Editor, Chief Multimedia Producer and Video Journalist. He also worked at ABCNews.com from 1999-2000. McGhee graduated from Columbia Journalism School in 1999.
Michele McLellan (@michelemclellan)
Consultant
News, Improved
Michele McLellan is a consultant who helps news organizations, online news start ups, and news entrepreneurs adapt to a dynamic emerging local media environment. She is lead programming consultant with the Knight Digital Media Center at USC Annenberg and KDMC News Leadership 3.0 blogger. As a 2009-10 Reynolds Journalism Fellow, she developed Michele’s List of promising online community news start ups. Michele also works as a Circuit Rider for the Knight Foundation, advising foundation-funded news and information projects around the United States. From 2003-07, she directed a $2.5 million Knight Foundation project that demonstrated the link between strategic newsroom training and the ability to adapt and innovate. She worked for more than 25 years as an editor in newspapers, including The Oregonian. She is an author of two books, “The Newspaper Credibility Handbook” and “News, Improved: How America’s Newsrooms Are Learning to Change.”
Susan Mernit (@susanmernit)
Founder
Oakland Local / House of Local
Susan Mernit is editor & publisher of Oakland Local, a news and community hub for Oakland, Calif., focused on social justice issues that combines reported stories with community media and diverse voices and training to bridge the digital divide. A former VP at AOL & Netscape, and a former Yahoo Senior Director, she is also a circuit rider for The Knight Community Information Challenge and a frequent facilitator for The Knight Digital Media Center at The Annenberg School of Journalism, USC. She is also a consultant focused on local media, community engagement and the future of news—see houseoflocal.org.
Qiana Mestrich (@mestrich)
SEO Consultant
Qiana Mestrich is a SEO and Social Media professional, specializing in the marketing and promotion of content for large publication sites. With over a decade of digital media experience, Qiana has a background in web content management and front-end production. She was previously SEM Manager at Beliefnet, which won a 2010 Webby Award in the Best Religion & Spirituality category. In 2007, a desire to mesh photography and digital media lead her to launch Dodge & Burn, a blog focused on diversity issues that profiles photographers and projects about communities of color worldwide.
Josh Meyer
Director, Education and Outreach
Medill National Security Journalism Initiative
Josh Meyer left the Los Angeles Times/Tribune in early 2010 to help launch the Medill National Security Journalism Initiative, which aims to find the best ways to do, and to teach, these all-important kinds of journalism in this changing media environment—especially across all digital platforms and in collaboration with mainstream media outlets. That includes covering terrorism, war, nuclear proliferation, intelligence and law enforcement reform. Meyer, who spent 20 years at the Times, the last 10 as national security writer, remains based in Washington, D.C., at the newsroom of Medill, the journalism school of Northwestern University. He leads groups of post-graduate students on three-month investigative projects and works with graduate students reporting for the Medill News Service. As director for education and outreach, he is also responsible for building the initiative into a full-fledged center that assists and informs working journalists and scholars as well as students and educators.
Jim Michaels (@jimmichaels)
Military Writer
USA TODAY
Jim Michaels, 53, covers military issues for USA TODAY. He has made about 20 reporting trips to Iraq and Afghanistan and has also covered conflicts in Israel, Haiti and Central America. Michaels is author of the new book, “A Chance in Hell: The Men who Triumped over Iraq’s Deadliest City and Turned the Tide of War” (June 2010, St. Martin’s Press). He has made frequent appearances on CNN, Fox and other cable news networks. Jim is a former Marine Corps infantry officer.
Mike Morris
VP, Services
Phase2 Technology
Michael Morris is the VP of Services at Phase2 Technology. He is focused on identifying and implementing the right solution for the right problem. Fifteen years of software engineering and project leadership experience have given Michael a keen insight into how to get from whiteboard to working software. He works pragmatically with customers to identify their problems, create bright ideas and then bring them to life. Michael and his team of analysts work throughout the entire project life-cycle refining the solution and steering the development team to a successful delivery. Well equipped in a variety of technologies and techniques, Michael has delivered successful solutions in a multitude of industries, including online publishing, open government, content management and social media. Michael holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Vanderbilt University and master”s degree in Engineering Management from The George Washington University.
Andrew Noyes
Manager, Public Policy Communications
Facebook
Andrew Noyes joined Facebook in 2009 after covering Capitol Hill, the White House, federal agencies, nonprofits, and think tanks as a member of the Washington press corps. In his current role, he nurtures relationships with policymakers, the press and the public and explains how the social networking giant helps its more than 400 million users share in a more trusted environment; helps makes the world more connected; and drives economic growth.
Mike Orren (@mikeorren)
Founder and Publisher
Pegasus News / The Daily You
Mike is the founder and publisher of Pegasus News and its affiliated Daily You sites. He started the company in 2005, growing it into the largest single-market pure-play local news and entertainment site in the U.S., shepherding it through two sales and a rollout to additional markets. Pegasus News has won a Dallas Press Club award as “best news website” and an EPpy as “best entertainment website.” Prior to Pegasus News, Mike was publisher of American Lawyer Media’s Texas Lawyer and Associate Publisher / General Manager of D Magazine. NBC 5 named him one of Dallas / Fort Worth’s most interesting people and the Dallas Business Journal placed him in their 40-under-40.
Jamie Pallot
Editorial Director
Conde Nast Digital
As Editorial Director of Condé Nast Digital, Jamie Pallot is responsible for the content and user experience of the company’s Web brands, including Style.com, Men.Style.com, Epicurious.com and Concierge.com. Jamie came to Condé Nast Digital from Time Inc. Interactive where, as an editorial consultant, he oversaw a redesign of People.com. Previously he spent three years as the Executive Producer at New York Sidewalk, the acclaimed online city guide published by Microsoft. He has also served as Editorial Director of the Canadian magazine, Web and TV company Shift Multimedia; Editorial Director of New Media for the News Corporation; and Editor of Britain’s Virgin Film Guide. His work at Condé Nast Digital has long been recognized, with sites under his direction receiving honors from the American Society of Magazine Editors and the James Beard Foundation. The sites have also won multiple Webby Awards and MIN (Media Industry Newsletter) Best of the Web Awards.
Bob Payne
Director of Communities
SeattleTimes.com
Bob Payne has been Director of Communities at seattletimes.com since summer of 2008. His primary task has been to determine and execute the Times’ strategy regarding neighborhood- and topic-specific content and the online communities of interest that thrive in those niche areas. While some media companies have chosen to launch their own sites as part of their hyperlocal strategy, the Times has opted instead to build relationships with local content producers with the goal of developing mutually supportive relationships that spotlight the strengths of the respective sites.
Mathilde Piard (@mathildepiard)
Social Media Manager
Cox Media Group Digital
Mathilde Piard is the social media manager at CMGdigital, which supports Cox Media Group’s 11 broadcast television stations, 86 radio stations, four metro newspapers, more than dozen non-daily publications and 130 websites with digital tools, technology and strategy. In her role, she consults with the publications and stations on the best ways to leverage social media to engage communities and is responsible for the development of social features and functionality on all Cox Media Group websites. Prior to joining CMGdigital, Mathilde worked as an internet producer at The Palm Beach Post and earned her master’s degree in new media at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
Aron Pilhofer (@pilhofer)
Editor, Interactive News
The New York Times
Aron Pilhofer is editor of Interactive News at The New York Times, overseeing a news-focused team of journalist/developers who build dynamic, data-driven applications to enhance The Times’ reporting online. He is also co-founder of two journalism nonprofits: Hacks and Hackers and DocumentCloud, a project designed to improve journalism by making source documents easier find, search, analyze and share online. DocumentCloud was awarded a $719,000 grant by the Knight Foundation in 2009.
Rufus Pollock
Founder
Open Knowledge Foundation
Dr. Rufus Pollock is a Director of the Open Knowledge Foundation, which he co-founded in 2004, and the Mead Fellow in Economics at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge. He has worked extensively, as a scholar, coder and activist on the technological, social and legal issues surrounding access and sharing of knowledge. Recent work includes assisting with the development of community and government data catalogues such as data.gov.uk and ckan.net; and helping citizens track how and where their tax money is spent with wheredoesmymoneygo.org project.
Richard Pope
Product Director
ScraperWiki.com
Richard Pope is a programmer and interaction designer who has been building award-winning transparency and civic related web services since 2005 based on screen-scraping and crowd-sourcing of data. These include ElectionLeaflets.org, PlanningAlerts.com and GroupsNearYou.com.
Tracy Record
Editor
WestSeattleBlog.com
Tracy Record most recently worked as the assistant news director at KCPQ-TV in Seattle, a position she resigned in December 2007 to work on WestSeattleBlog.com full-time. Record also spent two years with the Walt Disney Internet Group in roles including executive producer of ABCNEWS.com. She worked at KOMO-TV for eight years and became its first-ever executive producer of new media. Record has worked at TV stations, newspapers, and radio stations in California, Nevada, and Colorado, and earned three Emmy Awards.
Sarah Rich (@sarahrich)
Co-Founder
Longshot Magazine
Sarah Rich is a writer, editor and content strategist. She co-founded Longshot Magazine (originally 48HR Magazine) this year as an experiment in rapid-prototyped and crowdsourced print media. She also co-founded the Foodprint Project, a series of conversations investigating urban design through the lens of food. She is a former senior editor at Dwell magazine and co-author of the book “Worldchanging: A User’s Guide for the 21st Century.”
Ken Richieri
SVP, General Counsel & Secretary
The New York Times Company
Kenneth A. Richieri became Senior Vice President of The New York Times Company in December, 2007. He was made general counsel of The New York Times Company in January 2006. He served as deputy general counsel from 2001 until 2005, and was promoted to vice president in December 2002. He served as assistant general counsel for The New York Times Company since January 1993. Previously, he was senior counsel since January 1989. He joined The New York Times Company in January 1983 as legal counsel. Before joining the Times Company, Ken was an associate at Cahill Gordon & Reindel from October 1976 through December 1982. He received an A.B. degree in political science from Brown University in 1973 and a J.D. degree from Harvard Law School, graduating cum laude, in 1976. He is married, has three children and lives in New York City.
Alicia Roberts
Project Manager
Charlotte Observer
Alicia Roberts is director of partner relations for the Charlotte Observer’s hyper-local news project, the Charlotte News Network. She works with five founding publishers who produce eight community news sites in the region. She has worked as metro editor and features editor at The State, in Columbia, S.C., and as managing editor for several health care business publications in Washington, D.C. She started her newspaper career at the Dayton Daily News.
Anna Robertson (@annarobertson)
Director of Social Media & Original Video
Yahoo! News
Anna Robertson oversees social media strategy and executive produces original video content for Yahoo! News. Before coming to Yahoo! News in January 2010, Anna spent nearly a decade at ABC News, where she was an Emmy-award winning senior producer for “Good Morning America.”
Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu)
Professor of Journalism
New York University
Jay Rosen teaches journalism at New York University and is the author of the blog PressThink. In 2009, he founded the Studio 20 Program at NYU, which is focused on innovation in web journalism and uses the project method to instruct students in where journalism is today. Each week he co-hosts “Rebooting the News” with blogger and technologist Dave Winer of scripting.com.
Vivian Schiller
President and CEO
NPR
Vivian Schiller, who joined NPR as President and CEO in 2009, came from The New York Times Company where she served as Senior Vice President and General Manager of NYTimes.com. She oversees all NPR operations and initiatives, including the organization’s critical partnerships with its 800-plus member stations, and their service to the more than 26 million people who listen to NPR programming every week. Before joining NYTimes.com, she spent four years as Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Discovery Times Channel, a joint venture of The New York Times and Discovery Communications, and as Senior Vice President of CNN Productions, where she led long-form programming efforts. Documentaries and series produced under her auspices earned multiple honors, including two Peabody Awards, two Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University Awards and five Emmys.
Rii Schroer
Photographer / Videographer
The Times / Daily Telegraph
Rii Schroer is a UK-based, German born photographer and videojournalist. Her career took her from staff photographer at the South London Press to a staff agency position, working for the national UK press. For the last 2 1/2 years Rii has been working as northern correspondent for the Daily and Sunday Telegraph and the Times of London. She undertakes news and editorial work in England and abroad. With the introduction of the Canon 5DMarkII , Rii has established herself in cross-media and video storytelling for the Times and Telegraph’s web editions, alongside work for the papers’ print editions.
Zach Seward (@zseward)
Outreach Editor
The Wall Street Journal Online
Zach Seward is the outreach editor for The Wall Street Journal Online, where he works on social media, partnerships, and other projects. Previously, he was assistant editor of the Nieman Journalism Lab, reporting on the media industry. Before that, he covered education, health, and investment fraud for the Journal.
Tiffany Shackelford (@tiffanyshack)
Practice Manager, Journalism and Publishing
Phase2 Technology
Tiffany Shackelford has recently been named the executive director of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies. This follows three years at Phase2 Technology where she served as director of of communications and marketing and managed the publishing and journalism practice. From 2008-2010 she also served as the executive director of Capitolbeat, the Association of Capitol Reporters and Editors, a group she helped create in 1999. She created and organizes the Washington DC area Online News Association group which now numbers over 600, and was the 2008 co-chair for the ONA annual conference. Previously, Tiffany served as the Assistant Managing Editor at Stateline.org a nonprofit, nonpartisan online news site affiliated with the Pew Research Center that reports on emerging trends and issues in state policy and politics.
Alicia Shepard
Ombudsman
NPR
Alicia C. Shepard was appointed NPR’s ombudsman in October 2007. She serves as the public’s representative, and is responsible for bringing transparency to NPR’s journalism. She writes a blog, appears on NPR programs and provides guidance to NPR Member stations. She also teaches Media Ethics at Georgetown University, where she won the 2009 Dean Service award. Before NPR, Shepard taught journalism and contributed to Washingtonian magazine, Chicago Tribune, The New York Times and The Washington Post. She is author of “Woodward & Bernstein: Life in the Shadow of Watergate” and co-author of “Running Toward Danger: Stories Behind the Breaking News of 9/11” (2002). She is on the boards of the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism awards, the Fund for Investigative Journalism, and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
Delyn Simons (@delynator)
Director of Platform Strategies
Mashery
Delyn Simons has worked with API developers since 2004. These days she tracks the movements of developers in their natural habitat from Mashery, the API platform service provider for Best Buy, Netflix, New York Times, CBS Interactive, Etsy and many others. Previously, Delyn worked at eBay on their platform team managing developer community, marketing, events and PR. She can be found on Twitter @delynator and her blog at delynsimons.blogspot.com. When she’s not letting developers and clients know about the latest open platform opportunities, you can usually find her spending time with her husband and two kids in San Francisco.
Grant Slater
Grant Slater is a multimedia journalist based in Washington, D.C. His work has appeared in The Associated Press, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Jewish Telegraphic Agency and publications in his home state of Oklahoma. He holds bachelor’s degrees in journalism and Russian language from the University of Oklahoma. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in journalism at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. Starting in 2007, he worked as a freelance journalist covering the countries of the former Soviet Union, traveling widely across the region. His coverage included the 2008 conflict in Georgia and the local fallout from the global financial crisis.
Robin Sloan (@robinsloan)
Media Partnerships
Twitter, Inc.
Robin Sloan works on media partnerships at Twitter. Before that, he was a strategist at Current, an independent TV network co-founded by Al Gore and Joel Hyatt, and a reporter and producer at the Poynter Institute, a journalism school and think tank. Before Poynter, he graduated from Michigan State with a degree in economics. He’s also a writer who works at the intersection of storytelling and technology. You can learn more about him at robinsloan.com, and follow along at @robinsloan.
Evan Smith
CEO and Editor-in-Chief
Texas Tribune
Evan Smith is the CEO and Editor in Chief of The Texas Tribune. He spent nearly 18 years at TEXAS MONTHLY, stepping down in August 2009 as the magazine’s president and editor in chief to join The Texas Tribune. Previously he served as editor for more than eight years—only the third person to hold that title. On his watch, TEXAS MONTHLY was nominated for sixteen National Magazine Awards, the magazine industry’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize, and twice was awarded the National Magazine Award for General Excellence. A New York native, he has a bachelor’s degree in public policy from Hamilton College (Clinton, N.Y.) and a master’s degree in journalism from the Medill School at Northwestern University (Evanston, Ill.). He previously held editorial positions at a number of national magazines; most recently at The New Republic, where he was deputy editor.
Sherrese Smith
Legal Advisor
Federal Communications Commission
Sherrese Smith is the Legal Advisor for Media, Consumer, and Enforcement issues for Chairman Genachowski at the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”). Prior to working at the FCC, she was the Vice President and General Counsel of Washington Post Digital, The Washington Post Company’s internet and new media subsidiary. Washington Post Digital publishes washingtonpost.com, Slate.com, Foreign Policy, TheRoot.com, TheBigMoney.com and Loudounextra.com. At Washington Post Digital, she focused on matters pertaining to privacy, Intellectual Property, internet and media law, as well as technology, licensing and commercial transactions. Prior to Washington Post Digital, she worked at Arnold & Porter in Washington, D.C., where she was a member of the Intellectual Property Practice group. At Arnold & Porter, her work focused on prosecution, enforcement and counseling in the areas of copyright, internet law, trademark and domain name matters.
Robert Soden (@rsoden)
Lead GIS Developer
DevelopmentSeed
Robert is the senior GIS developer at Development Seed, where he leads the development of major data projects. With his background in international development, participatory mapping, and vulnerability analysis and technical expertise in GIS, mapping software, and web technologies like Drupal, Robert brings a unique skillset to projects that helps him guide them from their initial strategy to their final execution. Robert is a regular presenter on data collection and new mapping technologies, having spoken at conferences including the International Crisis Mappers Conference, the State of the Map, Innovations in Mobile Data Collection for Social Action, DrupalCon, and the International Studies Association Conference.
Jim Spencer (@jamesjspencer)
Founder
Newsy
Jim Spencer, president of Newsy, has held leadership positions at both start-up and established Internet companies.
Prior to founding Newsy, Jim was VP of Content and Answers at Ask Jeeves (Ask.com), where he helped the company reach the 15th ranking of all Internet sites. Earlier in his career, Jim was the GM of News and Information Programming at AOL, in charge of content, business and partnership operations; and director of strategic partnerships at NBC for MSNBC.com. Jim earned his BFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and his master’s in journalism at the University of Missouri.
Hari Sreenivasan (@hari)
Corrspondent
PBS NewsHour
Hari Sreenivasan joined the “PBS NewsHour” in December 2009 as an online and on-air correspondent. Hari makes regular news updates throughout the day on the NewsHour’s Web site in addition to appearing nightly on the “PBS NewsHour” television broadcast. Prior to joining the “PBS NewsHour,” Hari reported on the “CBS Evening News,” “The Early Show;” and “CBS Sunday Morning.” Before that, he served as an anchor and correspondent for ABC News, working extensively on the network’s 24-hour digital service “ABC News Now.” He is the recipient of the 1997, 1998 and 1999 Outstanding Broadcast Story Award presented by the South Asian Journalists Association. Sreenivasan is also a member of the Asian American Journalists Association. He was born in Mumbai, India, where he also spent his early childhood. Sreenivasan graduated from the University of Puget Sound in 1995 with a degree in mass communication and minors in politics and philosophy.
Mark Stephens
Partner
Finers Stephens Innocent
Mark Stephens is a partner at Finers Stephens Innocent in London. Mark has practiced before every level of court in England and Wales and has also practiced abroad and before international tribunals and courts. Mark regularly undertakes libel, newsgathering, reporting restrictions, media and copyright work. He has advised clients on copyright tribunal cases, comparative work and advice for multinationals and cross jurisdictional media law and regulation, and IP rights. Mark has a deep interest and commitment to fundamental human rights and regularly practises before the European Court of Human Rights, principally on freedom of expression issues.
Kara Swisher
Co-Executive Editor
All Things Digital
Kara Swisher is Co-Executive Editor of All Things Digital. With Walt Mossberg, she currently co-produces and co-hosts D: All Things Digital, a major high-tech conference with interviewees such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and many other leading players in the tech and media industries. A former reporter for the Washington Post, he is the author of “aol.com: How Steve Case Beat Bill Gates, Nailed the Netheads and Made Millions in the War for the Web” and the sequel, “There Must Be a Pony in Here Somewhere: The AOL Time Warner Debacle and the Quest for a Digital Future.”
Gary Symons (@poddiohead)
Founder and CEO
VeriCorder Technology Inc.
Gary Symons is a veteran journalist who was one of Canada’s first mobile journalists. At CBC News, he was the “Disaster Guy;” the reporter who was first in at floods, fires, and major homicide cases throughout the rugged interior region of British Columbia. He’s the man they sent BEFORE the satellite trucks arrive. Symons carried approximately $40,000 worth of equipment for that job, but found traditional broadcast equipment was badly designed for mobile journalism. Symons founded VeriCorder Technology in 2008, which released a comprehensive mobile journalism system in May this year, designed for use by TV, newspapers, radio, and online media. Symons is an expert on real-time reporting, mobile journalism, and wireless mobile technology.
Juan Thomassie (@jthomassie1)
Senior Designer
USA TODAY
Juan Thomassie is a Senior Designer specializing in data-driven interactive graphics for USA TODAY. His design and development experience and interest in data visualization have evolved over the last 20+ years from print to television and now online for news companies across the United States. For a look at some recent projects or to download his resume, go to 3diesel.com.
Matt Thompson (@mthomps)
Editorial Product Manager
NPR
Before coming to NPR, Matt led online community projects for the Knight Foundation and the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Vita.mn, the site he launched while at the Star Tribune, was a two-time NAA Digital Edge award winner for best local entertainment site. As a Donald W. Reynolds Fellow at the Reynolds Journalism Institute, Matt explored what news sites could learn from Wikipedia, blogging his research at Newsless.org. Matt has been a reporter for the Fresno Bee and the Poynter Institute, where he and his colleague Robin Sloan created the viral short film EPIC 2014, a history of the media set 10 years in the future. Matt graduated from Harvard College in 2002 with a degree in English.
Baratunde Thurston (@baratunde)
Web Editor
The Onion
Baratunde Thurston is a comedian, author and vigilante pundit. He was nominated for the Bill Hicks Award for Thought Provoking Comedy, declared a Champion of the First Amendment by Iowa State, and called “someone I need to know” by Barack Obama. In addition to hosting television programs, helping run a political blog and writing a book called “How To Be Black,” Baratunde is the web editor for America’s Finest News Source, aka The Onion. In this position, he oversees all of The Onion’s digital experiences including the browser, smartphone apps, mobile web, tablets, e-readers and social media. Baratunde resides in Brooklyn, N.Y., and lives in Twitter.
Jon Vidar
Freelance Photographer
Jon Vidar is a freelance photographer who focuses on capturing moments and telling stories through new media and visual imagery. Based out of Los Angeles, Calif., Jon works regularly for the Associated Press with photos published by the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, USA Today and NEED Magazine. His work has received honors from Getty Images, the National Press Photographers Association, FotoweekDC, and Microsoft. He also serves as the Executive Director for The Tiziano Project, an international nonprofit that seeks to empower communities through self-sustaining journalism. In 2007, Jon helped this project establish it’s first base of operations in Kigali, Rwanda and in the Summer of 2008, he piloted a two-week long multimedia workshop in Northern Iraq. Jon just returned from running a three-month program in Iraqi Kurdistan during the summer of 2010 in which they completed The Tiziano Project | 360 Kurdistan, an immersive multimedia look into the cultures of the region.
Matthew Waite (@mattwaite)
Senior News Technologist
St. Petersburg Times
Matt Waite is the Senior News Technologist at the St. Petersburg Times and developer of PolitiFact.com, the winner of the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. He was an award-winning reporter and author before moving into web development, specializing in database and statistical analysis for investigative reporting. He is co-founder of Hot Type Consulting, a firm specializing in app development for media clients.
Samantha Warren
Senior Designer
Phase2 Technology
Samantha Warren loves big concepts as much as she loves badass typography and thrives on telling interesting stories through usable interfaces. She has written articles for .net Magazine, regularly speaks at industry events and is on the Board of the Art Directors Club of Washington DC. When she is not doing any of the above you can find her enthusiastically teaching typography and web design at the Center for Digital Imaging Arts at Boston University.
Amy Webb (@webbmedia)
CEO
Webbmedia Group
Amy is an author, speaker and future thinker, adapting current and emerging technologies for use in communications. She has spent more than 15 years working with digital media, founding several web-based companies and now advising various startups and news organizations as well as Webbmedia Group’s clients all over the world. Previously, she covered emerging tech, media and biz trends for Newsweek and the Wall Street Journal. She has earned awards/nominations from Webby, E&P, IRE, SPJ, W3 and IAVA. She’s an alum of Columbia University’s Graduate J-school and holds Nikyu Certification in Japanese and speaks fluently. Amy serves on the boards of the Online News Association, Knight-Batten, Temple University’s Journalism Program and the International Center for Journalists. She is a featured speaker at media conferences and appears on many TV and radio shows.
Erik Wemple (@ErikWemple)
Editor
TBD
Erik Wemple is editor of TBD, a startup local news site that launched in August. Prior to his TBD stint, he edited Washington City Paper.
Jackson Wilkinson
Director of User Experience
Posterous
Jackson has been making great websites for over 15 years, playing almost every role along the way, from front-end developer to engineer to visual designer to product lead. While living in D.C., he made engaging and effective advocacy sites for non-profits with Grassroots Enterprise, and worked to launch and improve dozens of startups with Viget Labs. He moved to San Francisco to act as design lead for LinkedIn, and is now Director of User Experience at Posterous, where he helps millions share content more easily than ever. Jackson speaks at events internationally, tries to keep up a blog at jounce.net, and has a degree cum laude in music and philosophy from Bowdoin College.
Dave Winer (@davewiner)
Visiting Scholar
NYU
Dave Winer, 55, is a visiting scholar at NYU’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. He pioneered the development of weblogs, syndication (RSS), podcasting, outlining, and web content management software; former contributing editor at Wired Magazine, research fellow at Harvard Law School, entrepreneur, and investor in web media companies. A native New Yorker, he received a master’s in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin, a bachelor’s in Mathematics from Tulane University and currently lives in New York City.
David Wright (@davewrightjr)
Lead Interactive Designer
NPR
David Wright is Lead Interactive Designer at NPR, where he designs and builds award-winning digital news platforms. Over the past decade, Wright’s work for news agencies has been recognized by organizations and publications including Communication Arts, Editor and Publisher, The Peabody Awards and AIGA. He’s taught classes in Web design and platform development at American University’s School of Communication and volunteers with the Society for News Design, White House News Photographers and the Online News Association.
