SXSW Interactive 2012 speakers

Adam Edmunds directs the company's strategic vision to help customers use feedback data to predict trends in customer/employee satisfaction and to take action that will positively impact the bottom line. Adam has led Allegiance to become the 5th fastest-growing private software company in the U.S. according to Inc. Magazine, and a Software Magazine Top 10. Edmunds entrepreneurial path got an early start when he founded two companies while still in college. In 2009, he sold one of those companies, ethics reporting software company SilentWhistle, to industry leader Global Compliance. He also purchased feedback software company Inquisite in 2009. Edmunds has received recognition for entrepreneurship, including Utah Business Magazine's 40 Under 40, Connect Magazine's "Entrepreneurs to Watch", Brigham Young University's (BYU) Entrepreneur of the Year, and 2010 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalist. He holds a master's in accounting degree from BYU.

Aimee Kendall Roundtree is an Associate Professor in the Professional Writing Program at the University of Houston-Downtown, where she teaches courses in medical and science writing, social media, hypermedia and technology, Web publishing and accessibility, visual design, and technical communication. She has helped oversee social media campaigns for organizations including the Association of Teachers of Technical Writing and Connexions journal. She also serves as a medical writer and qualitative researcher in the Texas Medical Center, where she has participated on research teams at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Baylor College of Medicine, and the Houston Center for Quality of Care and Utilization Studies. She has also been a communications specialist for the Texas Medical Foundation and an assistant editor at Ladies’ Home Journal magazine. She is currently working on several projects, including a book manuscript on the rhetorical nature of computer simulations, another on organizational uses of social media, and manuscripts on health-related uses of Facebook, Twitter and blogs.

Al Nevarez is Allegiance's VP of product Management has spent the last 6 year designing and deploying Voice of Customer platforms. His human friendly product designs integrate data visualization, statistics, data mining, text mining, and social media to help companies achieve high customer & employee satisfaction and loyalty. Nevarez has lead product management for VOC solutions in place at some of the most admired and successful companies in the world, including Apple, Nike, Fidelity, Sephora, Gold's Gym, HP, Cummins, Jetblue, EMC, SAP, and Cloudera. Key metrics have included NPS, Csat, or composite scores which were important to each client. In all cases, the insights gained from the VOC program have lead to either product improvements, process improvements, merchandizing decisions, or investment decisions at various levels of the respective organization. Always innovating, always creating, he enjoys balancing business, users, and technology to create breakthrough products. His hobbies include writing mashup web and mobile applications, mountain biking, and photography.

Anil Dewan Bio
Anil Dewan is director of new media for KCRW and KCRW.com. He oversees the radio station's digital strategy and operations and is responsible for expanding the organization's presence to social media, blogs, and developing its mobile presence. He oversaw KCRW's most recent project, the KCRW Music Mine -- an iPad app focused on music discovery. Prior to KCRW, Anil was director of new media at Los Angeles public television station, KCET and worked closely with PBS, NPR and the BBC.

Entrepreneur and co-author, most recently, of THE START-UP OF YOU: ADAPT TO THE FUTURE, INVEST IN YOURSELF, AND TRANSFORM YOUR CAREER.

Carmen leads social media and content strategy for Babcock & Jenkins, a B2B integrated marketing agency in Portland, Oregon. Prior to her current position, Carmen was a senior copywriter for BNJ and her own creative communication consultancy, Prosody. Carmen began her career a stone's throw from here, as a TV news reporter and producer at KXAN-TV, where she chased ambulances, fire trucks, tornados and politicians. Now she just follows them on Twitter.

Dan Rubenstein is a video host and writer. He counts himself amongst the most esteemed alumni of the University of Oregon (class of 2005) that have also created an online video series interviewing college football tailgaters. He resides in Los Angeles, CA, where he embraces the spread option while struggling to avoid the watchful eye of TMZ cameras.

Dave Kerpen is the co-founder and CEO of Likeable Media, an award-winning social media and word-of-mouth marketing firm. Dave’s book, a New York Times Best Seller, is “Likeable Social Media: How to Delight Your Customers, Create an Irresistible Brand, and Be Generally Amazing on Facebook and other social networks.” Dave is proud of his Likeable business accomplishments but prouder of his wife and business partner Carrie and two daughters at home in New York , Charlotte and Kate.

Biographical Sketch of Gary Hirshberg Gary Hirshberg is the husband of writer Meg Hirshberg and the father of three yogurt eaters. He is Co-Founder and Chairman of Stonyfield Farm, the world’s leading organic yogurt producer, and the author of Stirring It Up: How to Make Money and Save the World (Hyperion, 2008). Gary frequently speaks on topics including sustainability, organic agriculture and the profitability of green business. Since 1983, Gary has overseen Stonyfield’s growth, from its infancy as a seven-cow organic farming school to its current $360 million in annual sales. Stonyfield has enjoyed a compounded annual growth rate of over 23% over 21 years, by consistently producing great-tasting products and using innovative marketing that blends the company’s social, environmental, and financial missions. Stonyfield entered into a partnership with Danone in 2001, and Gary is now Managing Director of Stonyfield Europe, with organic brands in Canada, Ireland, and France. Gary serves on several corporate and non-profit boards including Applegate Farms, Honest Tea, Peak Organic Brewing, The Full Yield, Climate Counts, SweetGreen, RAMp Sports, Glenisk, and the Danone Communities Fund. He is the chairman and co-founder of Stonyfield Café, a natural fast food restaurant firm. In 2011, President Obama appointed Gary to serve on the Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations. He is also co-chair of AGree an agricultural policy initiative formed by the Ford, Gates, Kellogg, Rockefeller, Walton Family and other leading foundations. Recently, he has helped to lead the consumer drive to require genetically engineered foods to be labeled. He is a founding Partner of Just Label It, We Have the Right to Know, the national campaign dedicated to labeling genetically engineered foods, and is co-author of Label It Now – What You Need to Know About Genetically Engineered Foods (New Word City, 2012), the first consumer guide to foods that have been genetically altered. All proceeds from the electronic book benefit Just Label It. Gary has received nine honorary doctorates and numerous awards for corporate and environmental leadership. He was named a Gordon Grand Fellow at Yale, one of “America’s Most Promising Social Entrepreneurs” by Business Week and one of the top ten, “most inspiring people in sustainable food.” by Fast Company. Gary was also featured in the successful 2009 documentary film, "Food, Inc." And you can see him in the “Just Eat Organic” Rap Video he wrote and performed on YouTube.
Stonyfield has garnered several prestigious awards over the past few years including EPA Clean Air Excellence (2009), “Business of the Decade – Manufacturing & Technology” (Business NH Magazine), “2010 Top 10 Leaders of Change Award” (The Foundation for Social Change and UN Office for Partnerships), “One of the Five Best Large Companies to Work for in New Hampshire” (Business NH Magazine & NH Businesses for Social Responsibility, 2010), “Best Environmentally Friendly/’Green’ Business (New Hampshire Business Review, 2011), and the Institute of Packaging Professionals AmeriStar Award for Stonyfield’s Plant-based Yogurt Cup (2011). Previously, he directed the Rural Education Center, the small organic farming school from which Stonyfield was spawned and Executive Director of The New Alchemy Institute – a research and education center dedicated to organic farming, aquaculture, and renewable energy. Before that he was a water-pumping windmill specialist and an environmental education director with the US Fish and Wildlife Service. He also authored books on wind-power and organic gardening.

Account planner, digital strategist, online community alum, brand thinker and Internet tinkerer.

HEATHER BROWNE has written the Fuel/Friends Music Blog (www.fuelfriendsblog.com) since 2005. Fuel/Friends is the most widely-read independent music blog in Colorado, and Heather was named one of 'Ten Women Music Writers to Read Now' by NPR in 2010. Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, she now lives and rocks in Colorado. She plays the drums, but not very well, is always on the lookout for new songs to love, and has a day job at a liberal arts college.

Meg is a freelance writer for magazines. In 2009, she began writing a regular column, called “Balancing Acts,” for Inc. magazine. Meg’s column explores the intersection of family and business, and work/life balance issues in an entrepreneurial setting. She also addresses this subject in speaking appearances. (For a compendium of Meg’s writing, see her website, www.meghirshberg.com.) Meg’s book, For Better or For Work: A Survival Guide for Entrepreneurs and Their Families, expands on her column topics. Meg worked in her husband Gary’s company, Stonyfield Yogurt, for the first several years of the business—and of her marriage to Gary, whom she’d met at an organic farming conference. Stonyfield took nine painful years to reach profitability, and now, at $370 million in sales, it is the largest organic yogurt company in the world. After Meg stopped working in the business, she wrote two yogurt cookbooks, and launched her writing career. Her work has appeared in Yankee, New Hampshire Magazine, and the Boston Globe Magazine, among others. Meg also enjoys teaching nonfiction writing at a community college. Meg grew up outside New York City and graduated from Brown University with a degree in Comparative Literature. After college she moved to California to work on an organic farm and run a science education garden for elementary school children. Meg’s interest in organic growing led her to get a Master’s degree from Cornell Agriculture School, after which she was hired to manage a large organic vegetable operation in New Jersey, where she lived until moving up to join Gary at Stonyfield Farm in New Hampshire. Meg and Gary have three children.

Nick is on the digital strategy team at Leo Burnett/Arc Worldwide, where he helps brands understand their audience's digital behaviors and how best to engage people in participatory digital behaviors. Clients include Purina, Esurance, P&G, and McDonald's. Prior to Leo/Arc, Nick managed multiple products at Cars.com, including the launch of a very successful iPhone app and the launch of the consumer finance channel. He earned his MBA from DePaul University, is a proud graduate of Penn State, and of course an avid college football fan.

Philipp Eibach (30) has been working on wahwah.fm for just over two years now. Having emerged from T-lab's entrepreneurial program, wahwah.fm took on a life its own in October 2010 and is now in the final stages of releasing its main product: the wahwah.fm iPhone app. Before wahwah.fm Eibach completed his dipl. studies in Design at the University of Arts in Berlin and a Master of Arts in St.Gallen, Switzerland. He then led his own media agency in Munich, working for clients such as Nike & Coca-Cola.

Reid Hoffman is a Partner at Greylock, and Co-Founder and Executive Chairman at LinkedIn. Reid joined Greylock Partners in 2009. His areas of focus include consumer Internet, enterprise 2.0, mobile, social gaming, online marketplaces, payments, and social networks. Reid likes to work with products that can reach hundreds of millions of participants and businesses that have network effects. An accomplished entrepreneur, executive and angel investor, Hoffman has played an integral part in building many of today’s leading consumer technology businesses, including LinkedIn and PayPal. He possesses a unique understanding of consumer behavior and the dynamics of viral businesses as well as deep experience in driving companies from the earliest stages through periods of explosive growth. Hoffman co-founded LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional networking service, in 2003. LinkedIn is thriving with more than 63 million members in 200 countries around the world and a diversified revenue model that includes subscriptions, advertising and software licensing. Hoffman led LinkedIn through its first four years and to profitability as Chief Executive Officer, Prior to LinkedIn Hoffman served as executive vice president at PayPal, where he was a founding board member. At PayPal he was responsible for all external relationships, including payments infrastructure, business development, international, government and legal. Reid was instrumental to PayPal’s acquisition by Ebay and responsible for partnerships with Intuit, Visa, MasterCard and Wells Fargo. Reid is a board observer at Airbnb, Gowalla, and Swipely and is a director at Zynga, Mozilla Corp., Six Apart, Shopkick, and Kiva.org. He is an angel investor in numerous influential Internet companies, including Digg, Facebook, Flickr, Last.fm, Ning, Six Apart and Zynga. Hoffman earned a Master’s degree in Philosophy from Oxford University, where he was a Marshall Scholar, and a Bachelor’s degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University, where he graduated with distinction. In 2010 Reid was the recipient of an SD Forum Visionary Award and named a Henry Crown Fellow by The Aspen Institute.

Rohit Bhargava is a marketing expert focused on how to bring more humanity back to business. He is a founding member of the world's largest team of social media strategists at Ogilvy and the best selling author of Personality Not Included, a guide to building a brand personality. His award winning Influential Marketing blog and other writings have been featured in media globally including Fast Company, Inc, The Guardian (UK), MarketingChina, and New York Times. He teaches marketing at Georgetown University and is a frequent "non-obvious" keynote speaker on business topics around the world. Rohit's second book called LIKEONOMICS will be published globally in May of 2012.

I ride bikes + design software at MSFT in Seattle, before that I ran two consulting business in Toronto helping business start and get better with Ruby on Rails and MSFT Access.

SCOTT PERRY's consulting and marketing firm Sperry Media helps tech companies, TV networks, film studios, record labels, and beverage brands find their target audiences. Perry’s newmusictipsheet.com emails bring healthy debate over emerging technologies and best practices every Monday morning.

Ty Hildenbrandt is a 2004 graduate of the Pennsylvania State University. To the confusion of most, he’s also a rabid Notre Dame fan. He currently lives in Allentown, PA, where Yocco’s hot dogs are king, Billy Joel is an icon, and the first day of hunting season is a school holiday.