Catherine Geanuracos
General Manager, Live Earth
Catherine Geanuracos leverages technology and media to create global movements that respond to the most urgent social and political issues of our time. She oversees multiple components of Live Earth as its General Manager, including program development, interactive strategy, public relations, sponsorship procurement and management, and nonprofit and promotional partnerships. From 2004-2006, Catherine served as a consultant for MoveOn.org Political Action, helping to shape innovative programs that used technology to fundamentally expanded opportunities for political engagement.
She was the founding CTO of MomsRising.org and is a member of Carpool on Facebook’s advisory board, and provides consultation to Mozes, Inc. on leveraging mobile technology platform for political and nonprofit clients. Catherine developed leadership in social advocacy while completing her B.A. at Columbia College, and her Master’s Degree in social welfare from UC Berkeley. She lives in Los Angeles.
Rob Kramer
Founder and CEO, PopRule
Rob has spent the past 20 years as an entrepreneur and executive in the media, technology, environmental, and non-profit sectors. Rob is the CEO and co-founder of PopRule, www.poprule.com.
PopRule is a web services company that creates applications to power the action layer on the web and mobile devices through its makes content actionable algorithm. Rob has consulted for various companies in the sustainable business and water sectors including Johnson Diversey, Cydcor and Product Partners.
Previously, Rob was CEO of Uprizer, Inc., an Intel-funded peer-to-peer enterprise software company that sold in 2005. From 1993 to 1999, Rob was Co-Founder and CEO of Moving Pixels, www.movingpixels.com, a successful independent computer animation studio in Los Angeles. In 1999, Rob sold his interest in this 16-year old company. He began his career in 1988 as President and Executive Producer of Pagan Films, a major label music video and commercial production company.
Since 2003, Rob has been Chairman of Global Water Trust, www.globalwatertrust.org, a Santa Monica based non-profit that provides clean safe water to school children throughout the developing world. GWT has provided clean safe water to over 10,000 people in Bangladesh, Nepal and Kenya. Rob serves on the Board of Directors of Sustainable Business Council www.sustainblebc.org and Eco Dads www.ecodads.org, and on the Los Angeles Committee for Global Green USA www.globalgreen.org
Beth Kanter
Beth’s Blog
Beth is the author of Beth’s Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media (http://beth.typepad.com), one of the longest running and most popular blogs for nonprofits. A frequent contributor to many nonprofit technology web sites,blogs, and magazines, published author, and much in demand speaker for nonprofit and social media industry conferences. She is curating NTEN’s “We Are Media: Nonprofit Social Media Starter Kit,” an online community of people from nonprofits who are interested in learning and teaching about how social media strategies and tools can enable nonprofit organizations to create, compile, and distribute their stories and change the world.
In 2009, she was named by Fast Company Magazine as one of the most influential women in technology and one of Business Week’s “Voices of Innovation for Social Media.” She is the 2009 Visiting Scholar for Social Media and Nonprofits for the Packard Foundation. She is co-author, with Allison Fine, of a book tentatively titled “The Networked Nonprofit” to be published by J Wiley in 2010.
Tom Watson
Co-founder and Managing Partner, Causewired
Tom Watson is the co-founder and managing partner of CauseWired Communications LLC (www.causewired.com) and the author of CauseWired: Plugging In, Getting Involved, Changing the World (Wiley, 2008). A journalist with 25 years experience, Tom has written for The New York Times, The Daily Beast, SocialEdge, Huffington Post and many other publications. He co-founded pioneering online protoblog @NY in 1995 and philanthropic services company Changing Our World, Inc. in 2000.
Ian Schafer
Founder and CEO, Deep Focus
Ian Schafer, CEO and Founder of Deep Focus, is one of advertising’s most influential voices in interactive marketing and social media and strives to not just bring consumers closer to brands, but closer to each other. Prior to founding Deep Focus, Ian was VP of the New Media division of Miramax Films.
Deep Focus, OMMA Magazine’s 2007 Media Planning & Buying Agency of the Year and winner of a 2007 Cannes Promo Lion, is an experience- and engagement-driven, thought-leading interactive marketing firm that boasts a client roster that includes some of the most recognizable names in entertainment, lifestyle and CPG brands such as HBO, AMC, ESPN, Microsoft, Weight Watchers, Bulgari, Diageo, Havaianas, and Nike.
Named a Media Maven by Advertising Age (where he is also a featured columnist and blogger) and one of Adweek’s Young Ones , Ian is considered by many as one of the foremost experts in interactive and social media marketing, and has been featured in Wired, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, Adweek, Advertising Age, USA Today, New York Magazine, Variety, CNN, Fortune and The Hollywood Reporter.
An avid technologist, Ian blogs at http://www.ianschafer.com and can be followed on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/ischafer.
Colin Nagy
Partner, Attention
Colin Nagy is a partner at Attention, a New York-based social media consultancy. In this role, he advises clients ranging from brands like The Ritz-Carlton and Herman Miller to media properties such as CNN, and The Daily Beast on how to leverage user-generated media to achieve their business objectives. Previously, he worked in political and crisis communications for a range of commercial and public sector entities around the world.
Nagy graduated from New York University with a degree in Politics and European studies.
His byline has appeared in AdWeek, innovation blog PSFK, as well as various arts and culture publications.
Kenny Miller
General Manager, Live Earth
He has developed, produced and launched casual and console video games, cable networks, social digital content, innovative websites and long form TV series over the course of his 20+ years as a pioneer in digital media.
Kenny’s current work is as the digital lead for Viacom’s partnership with the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation Get Schooled.
In 2006, Miller won an Emmy for the-N.com’s Video Mixer. On air and online, he led creative and integrated marketing teams to develop new forms of sponsored convergent media.
Prior to his work at Viacom Miller worked in Silicon Valley as a designer of experimental interfaces at Apple Computers Human Interface Group. Miller graduated from Northwestern University with a B.S. degree in Computer Engineering in 1987, and earned a Master’s degree in 1991 from the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts , where he has also served as an adjunct professor.
She was the founding CTO of MomsRising.org and is a member of Carpool on Facebook’s advisory board, and provides consultation to Mozes, Inc. on leveraging mobile technology platform for political and nonprofit clients. Catherine developed leadership in social advocacy while completing her B.A. at Columbia College, and her Master’s Degree in social welfare from UC Berkeley. She lives in Los Angeles.
Randi Zuckerberg
Marketing and Partnerships, Facebook
Randi Zuckerberg works on the marketing team at Facebook, where she manages partnerships related to media, news & current events, politics and non-profits.
Randi has led Facebook’s U.S. election and international politics strategy, in addition to managing media partnerships with companies such as ABC News and CNN. Previously, she worked at Forbes as part of the news show, Forbes on Fox and authored the book Spark Your Career in Advertising.
Randi has made appearances on Good Morning America, The Today Show, France 2 and World News to discuss Facebook’s marketing and political initiatives. Most recently, she represented Facebook as a correspondent for CNN’s Inauguration Day, State of the Union, and Michael Jackson Memorial live broadcasts.
Randi holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Harvard University
Racquel Recuero
Professor, Universidade Cat’lica de Pelotas (UCPel), Brazil
Raquel Recuero is an associate professor at the Departments of Applied Linguistics and Social Communication in Universidade Cat’lica de Pelotas (UCPel), Brazil since 2003. Her research focuses on Internet social networks, virtual communities and computer mediated-communication in general, trying to understand the impact of the Internet in sociability and language in South America and Brazil.
She received her PhD in Communication and Information from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) for her dissertation on “Social Networks in Fotolog.com” in 2006 and has recently published her first book “Internet Social Networks”(in Portuguese – Redes Sociais na Internet: Sulina, 2009). She also has worked as a research consultant for several companies, including Google and UOL. Raquel also maintains a blog on social media – http://www.raquelrecuero.com (in Portuguese) – since 2001 and posts regularly at Digital Media and Learning Research Hub blog – http://dmlcentral.net/.
Stephanie Agresta
Executive Vice President, Global Director of Digital Strategy and Social Media
Porter Novelli New York
Stephanie Agresta has been a force in the online marketing industry for nearly 15 years. An expert in social media, affiliate program management and Web 2.0 strategies, her mission is to connect people, ideas, products and services using digital technology in new and inventive ways. Stephanie has been instrumental in developing innovative digital media strategies for Fortune 500 brands including Microsoft, Windows Mobile and PepsiCo.
Stephanie started her career with iVillage, a women-focused Web destination and one of the first sites to build community online. She went on to hold prominent sales, marketing and business development roles with Internet powerhouses such as Barnes & Noble, Register.com and SpaFinder. With Commerce360, a search marketing firm funded by First Round Capital, she launched an affiliate marketing division and served on a management team alongside nationally recognized technology executives.
Stephanie comes to Porter Novelli after five years of developing her successful personal consultancy, forging partnerships with digital thought leaders and emerging technology companies. Representing the best of both worlds, she is known for combining innovation and insight with the accountability, focus and superior execution that Fortune 100 brands demand. Stephanie holds a master’s degree in public affairs from the University of Minnesota and a bachelor’s from Luther College. She blogs at internetgeekgirl.com and affiliate-karma.com/blog, and she tweets @stephagresta.
William C. Paley
President, 2023 LLC
Mr. Paley is president of 2023 LLC, an investment management firm specializing in real estate and emerging technologies. From 1980 to 1984, Mr. Paley was president of his own electronic media consulting firm, Paley Communications, which helped develop political applications for the World Wide Web. Mr. Paley supports a variety of nonprofit organizations in Washington, D.C. He is a director of the William S. Paley Foundation and the president of the William C. Paley Foundation. He is also a trustee of The Paley Center for Media. Mr. Paley is the son of William S. Paley, founder of CBS. Also, Mr. Paley is owner of La Palina Cigars, a firm founded by his grandfather Samuel Paley in 1896. The marketing of La Palina Cigars was instrumental in the founding of CBS.