Robert X. Cringely has been making or writing about high-tech history since 1977 when he was the 12th employee at Apple Computer. He was field editor at InfoWorld, a computer industry trade paper, from 1987-95. His best-selling book Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition and Still Can't Get a Date was published in 18 languages. His PBS documentaries, including Triumph of the Nerds and Nerds 2.01: A Brief History of the Internet, have been shown in 78 countries.

A blogger since 1997, he has 500,000 weekly Internet readers of his web page and more than a million words in print. A former columnist for Worth and Inc magazines, Cringely has written for Forbes, NewsWeek, MIT Technology Review, the New York Times and many other publications.

Most recently Cringely was a co-founder of an Open Source mortgage company, a revolutionary disk drive startup, and an Open Source-based video sharing site for World Cup enthusiasts.

Cringely lives in Charleston, SC where his kids use Ubuntu.

Jon "maddog" Hall is the Executive Director of Linux International (www.li.org), an association of computer users who wish to support and promote the Linux Operating System. During his career in commercial computing which started in 1969, Mr. Hall has been a programmer, systems designer, systems administrator, product manager, technical marketing manager and educator.

He has worked for such companies as Western Electric Corporation, Aetna Life and Casualty, Bell Laboratories, Digital Equipment Corporation, VA Linux Systems, and SGI. He currently works as an independent consultant, and is the CTO and Ambassador for VizzEco (www.Vizzeco.com) a Canadian firm that is involved with bringing environmentally friendly computing to emerging marketplaces.

Mr Hall has worked on many systems, both proprietary and open, having concentrated on Unix systems since 1980 and Linux systems since 1994, when he first met Linus Torvalds and correctly recognized the commercial
importance of Linux and Free and Open Source Software.

He has taught at Hartford State Technical College, Merrimack College and Daniel Webster College.

Mr. Hall is the author of numerous magazine and newspaper articles, many presentations and one book, "Linux for Dummies".

Mr. Hall has consulted with the governments of China, Malaysia and Brazil as well as the United Nations and many local and state governments on the use of Free and Open Source Software.

Mr. Hall serves on the boards of several companies, and several non-profit organizations.

Mr. Hall has traveled the world speaking on the benefits of Open Source Software, and received his BS in Commerce and Engineering from Drexel University, and his MSCS from RPI in Troy, New York.

Matt has been involved with open source since 1998 and is one of the open source industry's leading business strategists. He writes C/NETS open source blog, The Open Road and currently serves as chief operating officer (COO) of Canonical Ltd., the commercial sponsor of Ubuntu. At Canonical he's responsible for aligning strategic goals and operational activities, the optimization of day-to-day operations, and leadership of Canonical marketing and back-office functions.

Prior to Canonical, Matt served as VP, Business Development for Alfresco. Prior to joining Alfresco, Asay was one of the founding members of Novell's Linux Business Office in 2002 and was an early influencer and participant in the company's shift to open source. In 2003 he founded the Open Source Business Conference, the industry's premier open source strategy event, and has served as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence for Thomas Weisel Venture Partners, focusing on open source investment opportunities.

Before Novell, Asay was General Manager at Lineo, an embedded Linux software start-up, where he ran Lineo's Residential Gateway business. He is an emeritus board member of the Open Source Initiative (OSI).

Asay earned his Juris Doctorate degree at Stanford Law School, spending two of his three years studying software licensing and innovation, and specifically the GNU General Public License, under Professor Larry Lessig. He also holds Masters and Bachelors degrees from the University of Kent (Canterbury, UK) and Brigham Young University, respectively.

Chris Wanstrath is a George R R Martin fan who lives in San Francisco
and cofounded GitHub. He's an active open source developer and speaker
whose projects and talks can be found at http://defunkt.github.com/

Lee Congdon is responsible for Red Hat's global information systems, including the technology strategy, enterprise architecture, information technology governance, solutions delivery, and systems operations supporting the company. His role includes enabling Red Hat's business through services such as knowledge management, technology innovation, technology-enabled collaboration, and process improvement.

Congdon has over 26 years experience as an information technology leader. Prior to joining Red Hat, he was Managing Vice President, Information Technology at Capital One where he developed and delivered information technology solutions for the firm's corporate functions and Global Financial Services group. Before Capital One, Congdon was Senior - Vice President, Strategic Initiatives, at Nasdaq, where he led the organization's efforts to identify, implement, and operate technology solutions for Nasdaq Japan, Nasdaq Europe, and other strategic global ventures. Earlier, at Citicorp, Congdon led multiple global technology initiatives for the private bank and the corporate bank.

Congdon began his career at IBM as an operating system developer and held several technology and technical marketing positions of increasing responsibility with that firm. Congdon holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Computer Science from Purdue University and a Master's degree in Business Administration from the Kellogg School at Northwestern University.

Covering ALM, Web 2.0/RIA and OSS, Jeffrey serves Application Development & Program Management professionals. He is a leading expert on software modeling techniques, integrated development environments, and the emergence of new rich Internet application development practices and tools. Jeffrey holds a B.S. in economics (finance) from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Mr. Patten has spent the last 20 years developing educational software for a variety of clients. He has managed the engineering departments for several companies, including his own, and has won several awards for software design. He is currently bringing Open Source software solutions to schools to help maximize their technology dollars and close the digital divide between students of diverse economic backgrounds. Mr Patten is also the Executive Director of the National Center for Open Source and Education – a non profit organization advocating Open Source adoption in K-12 schools throughout the country.

Greg DeKoenigsberg is a senior community architect for Red Hat. The community architecture team is responsible for Red Hat's strategy for building vibrant open source communities, and for aligning Red Hat's community policies with its business objectives. Greg is the founding chairman emeritus of the Fedora Project Board, which is the ultimate decision making authority for the Fedora Project. He has been with Red Hat since 2001.

It is a well accepted fact that open source software products are frequently more flexible, more robust, and more cost-effective than their proprietary counterparts. Learn more about how the open source development model works, and how you can take advantage of this model to achieve your own goals more effectively.

Scott Chacon is a Git evangelist and Ruby developer working on GitHub.com. He is the author of the Pro Git book by Apress, the Git Internals Peepcode PDF as well as the maintainer of the Git homepage and the Git Community Book. Scott has presented at several conferences including OSCON, RailsConf, LinuxConf.au and PyCon. He also does corporate training on Git around the world.

Yehuda Katz, a new member of the Rails Core Ream, has been working with Ruby and Rails since before Rails 1.0. He is the lead developer of the Merb project, which recently announced a merger with Rails.

He is a member of the jQuery Core Team, and a core contributor to DataMapper. He contributes to many open source projects, like Rubinius and Johnson, and works on some he created himself, like Thor.

Yehuda is co-author of jQuery in Action, a contributor to Ruby in Practice, and is currently working on Merb in Action, set to be the first Merb book on the market.

He is currently employed by Engine Yard, where he works on internal development projects, and of course, Merb.

Keith Bergelt is the chief executive officer of Open Invention Network (OIN), the collaborative enterprise that enables innovation in open source and an increasingly vibrant ecosystem around Linux. In this capacity he is directly responsible for enabling, influencing and defending the integrity of the Linux ecosystem. Central to the achievement of his goals is the acquisition and transfer of patent rights designed to permit members of the Linux ecosystem to operate free of the threat of assertion and litigation from those whose business models are antithetical to innovation and global economic growth in information technology and computing.

Prior to joining the Open Invention Network, Mr. Bergelt served as president and CEO - [Expand]of two Hedge Funds – Paradox Capital and IPI – formed to unlock the considerable asset value of patents, trademarks and copyrights in middle market companies. Paradox and IPI were the first Funds of their kind to offer specialty lending products supported exclusively by intellectual property. Driven by Mr. Bergelt’s creativity and entrepreneurial approach, these funds enabled the emergence of patents, trademarks and copyrights as a viable source of collateral in asset-based loans, forever reshaping the emerging IP Finance landscape.

During Mr. Bergelt’s stewardship of these IP-based lending activities, he raised more than $300 million dollars and financed portfolio companies of private equity firms including Texas Pacific Group, Kelso & Co., JH Whitney, Weston Presidio, Goode Partners, Palladium Capital and Castanea Partners, among others.

Previously, Mr. Bergelt served as a senior advisor to the technology investment division at Texas Pacific Group. He also headed business development, intellectual property and licensing for the Kelso & Company portfolio company Cambridge Display Technology in the United Kingdom. Additionally, he established and served as General Manager of the Strategic Intellectual Asset Management business unit at Motorola Corporation and served as Motorola’s director of Technology Strategy.

Mr. Bergelt was a co-founder of the Intellectual Property Advisory Practice within the Electronics and Telecommunications Industry group at SRI Consulting in Menlo Park, California.

Prior to his extensive private sector experience, Mr. Bergelt served for twelve years as a diplomat with postings at the United Nations in NY and the American Embassy in Tokyo, Japan where he was involved in the negotiation of IP rights protection in Asia.

Mr. Bergelt holds an Artium Baccalaureus degree from Duke University, a Jurist Doctorate degree from Southern Methodist University School of Law and a Masters of Business Administration degree from Theseus Institute in France. He is a frequent speaker on corporate strategy, finance and intellectual property management.

Andy Lester has developed software for more than twenty years in the business world and on the Web in the open source community. Years of sifting through resumes, interviewing unprepared candidates, and even some unwise career choices of his own have spurred him to write this nontraditional book on the new guidelines for tech job hunting. Andy is an active member of the open source community, and lives in the Chicago area.

Mayor Bob Coble was elected as Mayor of Columbia in 1990. Mayor Coble has received numerous awards including Ambassador of the Year (2004), and Central Midlands Council of Governments Regional Leadership Award (2007). He was inducted into Richland One’s Hall of Fame in 2007. Mayor Coble was the also the recipient of the Global Vision Award presented by the World Affairs Council in October 2008. He is currently a board member with the River Alliance, Central SC Economic Development Alliance, and Engenuity.

Khush Tata is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the SC Technical College System (which consists of sixteen Technical Colleges, a Center for Accelerated Technology Training and a System Office headquarters). Prior to coming to the System, Mr. Tata was employed with the SC Department of Insurance as CIO and the SC Governor's Office as Director of Information Technology. 

Khush is the former Vice-Chair for the SC Enterprise Architecture Oversight Committee, the current Chair for SC Information Technology Directors Association and a Board member for EngenuitySC, The CIO Forum, Columbia Chamber of Commerce – Information Technology Council. He is a graduate of the Governor’s EXCEL Leadership Institute, SC Executive Institute, Leadership SC and the Riley Institute’s Diversity Leaders Initiative. He is involved with and has assisted several civic groups and government organizations with policies, issues and projects.

Khush possesses a BS in both Physics and Computer Science. 

Dr. Hogue has been Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer for the University of South Carolina System since 2000. He is responsible for the development of IT and distance education strategy, policy, and practice for approximate forty-three thousand USC students, faculty, and staff. The IT division provides strategic leadership and operational support for the University in information technology, instructional services, and e-learning services. The mission of the Division of IT is to support teaching, research, and service missions of the University.

Dr. Hogue represents USC in regional and national forums such as EDUCAUSE, Southeastern University Research Association (SURA), Health Sciences South Carolina (HSSC), and the national Cyberinfrastructure Task Force. He regularly publishes and delivers presentations on information technology issues and is a frequent guest lecturer in the classroom.

Dr. Hogue began his IT career as an evening shift computer operator at USC in 1979. Prior to returning to South Carolina to assume his current role, he held IT leadership positions at Vanderbilt University, the University of Wisconsin System, and MIT. He holds undergraduate and masters degrees from the University of South Carolina and a doctorate from Harvard University.

Randal M. Senn is the Chief Information Officer for SCANA Corporation, responsible for overseeing their technology services and strategies. Randy has been employed by SCANA for 33 years. He initially assumed his current responsibilities as General Manager of Information Services and Technology in August of 2001 and in May of 2003 he was named Chief Information Officer for SCANA Services, Inc.

Randy initially worked as a student intern from the USC Business School. After graduation, he started his full time career as a computer programmer.

Prior to his current role, he has served as a manager in the company’s Accounting Department, Customer Billing Department and Shareholder Services Department. Randy has served as project manager for a general ledger system implementation for the company, project manager for the company’s Year 2000 compliance project and project manager for the information technology consolidation project associated with the merger between SCANA Corporation and Public Service Company of North Carolina. He currently has responsibility for leading SCANA’s Smart Grid efforts.

SCANA Corporation:

SCANA Corporation is a $10 Billion Fortune 500 energy-based holding company whose businesses include regulated electric and natural gas utility operations and other energy related businesses. SCANA has 12 subsidiaries who serve approximately 623,000 electric customers in South Carolina and more than 1.1 million natural gas customers in South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia.

As Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Dale Johnston is responsible for managing all aspects of Edens & Avant’s technology initiatives and monitoring security of information platforms.

Johnston oversees the Information Technology team as it implements systems that improve internal operations, enhancing the Company’s ability to deliver and maintain state-of the-art retail projects. He holds numerous certifications, including an Applied Science Technologist designation with the Ontario Association of Certified Engineering Technicians and Technologists.
Previously the Vice President of Information Services for Canadian Real Estate Investment Trust in Ontario, Canada, Johnston developed and managed the technology vision for the company and supervised major system upgrade projects.

Johnston is a native of Ontario, Canada, and received a Bachelor of Applied Science from Bemidji State University and a diploma in Computer Electronics Engineering Technology from the Mohawk College of Applied Arts and Technology.

Director Simonowicz has been in the engineering and technology fields for over 30 years and has been an integral participant and leader for building complex digital service automation and control systems during this period. This includes designing and implementing copper and fiber network infrastructures, network security systems, data centers, machinery automation controls, disaster recovery systems and end user application delivery systems and services. Throughout his career he has had the challenge to address the need for frugality in cost accounting with a well balanced need for risk awareness and tolerance so as to develop industrialized solutions for maintaining business continuity and high performance in servicing his customer's business requirements.

He currently orchestrates and leads the Department of Information Technology (DoIT) for the City of Columbia by providing the leadership, strategic vision, and organization to promote the City's initiatives. His forte is to provide solid enterprise based solutions that multiply effect, efficiency and fiscal responsibility, while enhancing performance and the overall benefit of his organizations investment dollars. With a total commitment to quality and continuity of service he leads his team in promoting collaboration and strategic integration discipline to archive the City's goals and objectives. His motto is ‘Invest in doing it right the first time, for it pays dividends over the long haul'.

Director Simonowicz is a graduate of the University of Houston, Electrical Engineering & Technology & is a Certified Governmental Chief Information Officer, School of Government UNC

Mark Anzani is Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for System z. He has the responsibility for driving long term product technical strategy, as well as enabling innovative client projects involving System z. He joined IBM in Poughkeepsie in 1983 and during his career has had positions in a variety of product development disciplines, primarily focused on IBM large systems. In January 2004, Mark was appointed Vice President, System z Hardware Products with the responsibility for the development and launch of the hardware products within the System z Portfolio. In January of 2007, Mark was appointed Vice President of System z Technical Support and in March of 2009 added the Chief Technology Officer responsibilities to his role.

Ravi is responsible for current and future technology architectures including Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) to leverage mainframe assets, technical strategy, product roadmaps. Ravi was instrumental in bringing Linux on zSeries within a short period of time working closely with IBM implementation team. Today, BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina hosts most of its web applications in a Linux virtualized environment using industry standards like Web Services, SOA, Portal Frameworks, Content Management etc., on the Mainframe.

Prior to joining BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina, Ravi served as Chief Technology Advisor at the Global CIO office, Siemens AG, where he was responsible for developing Architectural Governance, Roadmaps in several technology areas for all Siemens companies worldwide as part of its standardization efforts. Prior to Siemens, Ravi started a technology consulting company to provide architectural expertise, eBusiness technologies for several startups, brick and mortar companies. Ravi also worked at Prime Computer/Computervision Corp.in Boston for 10 years where he held several Customer Service and management positions.

David is a strong proponent of the use of open sharing to facilitate secure code reuse, best practices, and in-depth security and visibility concepts in a collaborative environment as a fundamental requirement to a stronger overall digital ecosystem. Building upon a solid network security infrastructure, he and his team have completely re-developed, over the past four years, an extensible Offender Management System (OMS) and Parole Information Center (PIC) which is able to consume and publish secure web services as a focal point to manage the life-cycle of offenders and to enhance the organization's overall effectiveness in providing services to the community.

Prior to joining SCDPPPS in 1997, O'Berry served as Network Manager at the Department of Juvenile Justice. Since his move to SCDPPPS, David has been directly involved with South Carolina's Information Technology Solutions Committee in various capacities working towards standards and solutions in all areas of technology throughout the state. During his multi-year role as Chairman of the Security Sub-Domain Committee he, in 2007, co-led the effort to adopt a state-wide security policy achieving that goal with a unanimous vote in December of 2007 while substantially progressing and completing the initiative to establish comprehensive baseline security standards for South Carolina Agencies.

David has served as the Membership Director for the Midland's Chapter of the ISSA, the group's Director of Corporate Relations, and currently serves as the President for the chapter. He currently serves on the McAfee Cybersecurity Experts Council while working with standards driven organizations, like the Trusted Computing Group, to further the goals of practical, flexible, and open information security frameworks. He is also a member of the National Association of State CIO's Security and Privacy Sub-Committee as well as the Enterprise Architecture Committee. He currently serves on the Executive Committee for the MS-ISAC as well as on Legislative Sub-Committee. In 2008 he was awarded Technologist of the Year for the South Carolina IT Director's Association after being named an Honorable Mention for the same award in 2007. Mr. O'Berry holds an honors degree from the University of South Carolina Honors College as well as numerous professional certifications including CISSP-ISSAP, ISSMP, MCNE, CNE-I and CSPM.

Deborah Bryant is Public Sector Communities Manager at Oregon State University's Open Source Lab (OSU OSL) Through annual production of the Government Open Source Conference (GOSCON) and ongoing facilitation of state, local and federal government initiatives, Deborah has a unique and pioneering perspective and has earned an international reputation for expertise in the adoption and use of open source software and models in the pubic sector.

Deborah serves on the national Steering Committee for the recently launch Open Source for America (OSfA); as a Board Director for DemocracyLab.org; as a Board Advisor for the Open Source Digital Voting Foundation: as a Board Advisor for the Oregon Virtual School District.

Deborah's background includes over twenty years of management experience in information technology in the private and public sectors. Before joining OSU to create a public sector program at OSL, Deborah served as Oregon’s Deputy State Chief Information Officer. Her private sector background includes management positions in several emerging technology areas; parallel and high-speed computing and commercialized internet and web applications in the 80s, commercial wide area networks, advanced telecommunications and data/voice convergence in the 90s.