PdF2008 Update on Panels and Speakers
By Micah L. Sifry, 05/20/2008 - 2:59pm

We're still hard at work finalizing the program for this year's fifth annual Personal Democracy Forum, which is taking place June 23-24 at Rose Hall in New York City, and I'm pleased to be able to share these updates with you on speakers and panels. Don't wait til the last minute to register, by the way--the early bird rate is going to expire after May 31 and prices are going up. Save $100 by registering now.

We've added these panels to the mix on Monday's sessions, which are focused mainly on how technology is changing campaigns, elections and political media:
- Cyrus Krohn (RNC e-campaign director), Matt Ewing (MoveOn.org Operation Democracy), Austin Walne (Fred Thompson 2008), and Randall Winston (Project Agape/Facebook Causes) will explain "How to make ONFFLINE magic: converting online 'friends' to on-the-ground activists."
-Robert Scoble (FastCompany.tv), Bhaskar Roy (co-founder of Qik.com), and Keith McSpurren (president of CoveritLive.com) will talk about "Building and Using the World LIVE Web."

We're also pleased to announce that the following speakers will be joining us this year:
-Brian Behlendorf, a member of the Mozilla Foundation's board of directors, will join one of our plenary sessions to talk about open source and the importance of maintaining and expanding consumer choices online.
-Josh Silver (Free Press) is joining the session on defining national technology policy.
-W. David Stephenson (Stephenson Strategies) is joining the session of the strange bedfellow politics of transparency and the emergent power of watchdogging government from below.
-Sheila Campbell (USA.gov) is joining the session on "Design principles for online democracy: how to connect government and constituents in the internet age," replacing Bev Godwin.
-Joe Green (Project Agape/Facebook Causes) is joining the "Ideas that spread, win" session.
-John Geraci (outside.in is joining the real data geeks session, to talk going hyper-local with data, and
-Ben Geyerhan (ClicktoBlue) is joining the session on "New ways of making and spending money online."

We have several more major announcements coming. Stay tuned for details. But, as I said above, don't wait til the last minute to register; if you want to save money, sign up by May 31.



© 2008 Personal Democracy Forum | All Rights Reserved |