Bram Weinstein

Host

Bram Weinstein joined ESPN in May 2008 as an ESPNEWS anchor. ESPNEWS is the nation’s only all-sports news network, providing extensive highlights along with in-depth analysis, breaking news and press conferences.

Before joining ESPN, he worked at Redskin Radio in Washington, D.C., where he served as a host and reporter from 2006 to 2008. From 1999 to 2006, he hosted his own sports talk show and was a sports reporter with WTEM-AM in Washington, D.C. Prior to that, he served as a reporter and weekend anchor with KHAS-TV in Hastings, Neb., from 1996 to 1998. He began his career at CNN in Washington as a reporter from 1995 to 1996. In 2002, Weinstein was honored by the Washington, D.C. Achievement in Radio Awards as Best Sports Reporter for his coverage on Sportstalk 980. Weinstein is a native of Silver Spring, Md. He graduated from American University in 1995 with a bachelor’s degree in broadcast journalism.

Watch Bram's talk from 2010.

Seaton Smith

Host

Applying smooth charisma to a layer of explosive energy, topped off with unforgettable characters sure to permanently reside in your brain, Seaton Smith leaves his audience in a state of comedic euphoria as he killed performing on Opie and Anthony “Virus” tour and the “New Faces” show at Just For Laughs Comedy Festival in Montreal. He also is a online phenom signing a deal with Sierra Mist where he was able to showcase his chops at producing the skit “Pimpin Referee.” And he’s a YouTube favorite with his popular webseries, Annoy Charlie Smith Inc.

Watch Seaton's talk from 2010.

Christylez Bacon

REINVENTING Hip Hop

Christylez Bacon (pronounced: chris-styles) is a GRAMMY Nominated Progressive Hip-Hop artist and multi-instrumentalist from Southeast, Washington, DC. As a performer, Christylez multi-tasks between various instruments such as the West African djembe drum, acoustic guitar, and the human beat-box (oral percussion), all while continuing the oral tradition of storytelling through his lyrics.

With a mission towards cultural acceptance and unification through music, Christylez is constantly pushing the envelope – from performances at the National Cathedral, to becoming the first Hip-Hop artist to be featured at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, composing and orchestrating an entire concert for a 12-piece orchestra commissioned by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the Smithsonian Institute, or recording a Folk/Hip-Hop children’s album.

Dr. Jeff Benabio

REINVENTING Medicine

Dr. Benabio is a graduate of Brown University and Wake Forest University School of Medicine. He graduated first in his class in medical school and served as chief dermatology resident at the University of California Irvine. He's currently a Voluntary Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine at UCSD and partner physician at Kaiser Permanente in San Diego, CA. An award-winning speaker, he has addressed national audiences for Kaiser Permanente, the American Academy of Dermatology, and the American Telemedicine Association.

For over five years, Dr. Jeff Benabio has been using social media channels to help patients learn about skin health and disease and to help doctors learn about engaging patients more effectively. In his practice Dr. Benabio uses disruptive tools such as telemedicine and mobile devices to improve patient access and reduce medical costs. In his talk he'll show us how we're re-inventing medicine with Twitter and Facebook, and why it's the best thing to happen to medicine since vaccines.

Sam Calagione

REINVENTING Beer

Sam Calagione is the founder and President of Dogfish Head, a Delaware craft brewery producing “off-centered ales for off-centered people.” When Sam opened Dogfish Head in 1995, it was the smallest commercial brewery in America, brewing batches of 10 gallons at a time. Today, Dogfish Head is among the fastest growing breweries in the country, selling beer in 30 states and 3 countries. Sam is the maverick behind all of the “off-centered” things that happen at Dogfish Head, his passion and brainchild. He’s creating brews with unconventional ingredients: herbs and spices, raisins, wood, corn and Aztec cocoa powder.

Sam’s innovative style has earned him a reputation as one of America's most adventurous entrepreneurs. Ranked among Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business in 2011, he’s been named Businessman of the Year by The Small Business Association, and a Game Changer for 2010 by the Huffington Post.

He’s been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, Playboy, People, and Bon Appetit and was a finalist for the 2011 James Beard Awards (only the second beverage producer to ever be nominated). His books include Brewing Up a Business; Extreme Brewing: He Said Beer, She Said Wine and he was the host of Brew Masters on the Discovery Channel. Sam serves as the Vice Chair of the Brewers Association, an articulate ambassador for the craft-brewing world. He’s often on the road promoting Dogfish Head and the spirit of small business through beer, song, dance, and words. He has spoken for Fast Company, Inc. Magazine, corporations and associations around the country.

Christopher Chabris

REINVENTING Intuition

Christopher Chabris is a psychology professor at Union College in New York, where he studies intelligence, thinking, and decision-making. He is the co-author of the New York Times bestseller and Editor’s Choice book The Invisible Gorilla, and Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us, which is being translated into 17 languages. He shared the 2004 Ig Nobel Prize in Psychology (awarded for "achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think"), given for the experiment that inspired the book. Chris has spoken to audiences at major conferences and businesses, and his work has been published in leading journals including Science, Nature, Perception, and Cognitive Science. He is also a chess master, poker amateur, and contributor to the Wall Street Journal and other national publications.

Sam Moore Cicotello & Lee Burbage

REINVENTING The Workplace

Sam Moore Cicotello is the Dean of Motley Fool University and is responsible for all of The Motley Fool’s learning and development initiatives. She has 10 years of experience in marketing and product strategy and was shocked to find her passion in learning and leadership development. She embraces her marketing background in her current role and is constantly testing and learning within Fool U. She persistently encourages Fools to “try it” and “top it.” She was awarded the title of Chief Rabblerouser of the Highest Order by her peers in 2006 and still holds the coveted position.

Lee Burbage, People Fool At The Motley Fool, if it has to do with people, Lee is likely leading the charge. Lee, a graduate of the University of Maryland, has been with the Fool since 1998 when he joined from Bank of America. At Bank of America, he was a Regional Human Resources Manager covering Maryland, Northern Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Much of his work focused on mergers and acquisitions, building a sales culture, and management development in the retail business. At the Fool, our boy is not your typical HR executive. Lee has been able to shape an incredible culture where people use their passion and skills to deliver for our business. Often quoted and interviewed for our creative, market-leading HR practices, Lee is best known for his jump shot and great hair.

At the Motley Fool, Lee and Sam, Professional Boat Rockers and Envelope Pushers and Brain Expanders, are reconstructing the foundations of human and organizational development. The idea of work/life balance assumes that each happens separately. Your life doesn’t stop when you come to work. With a foundation of trust, respect they push the boundaries for performance and autonomy challenging and destroying long held “professional standards.”

Dominic Crapuchettes

REINVENTING Board Games

Dominic Crapuchettes has always been passionate about designing board games. One of his early games, Kabloogi, was banned from 8th grade because classmates played it during class. In high school, Dominic designed a trivia game called Conceptual Pursuit, which was later turned into the wildly popular Wits & Wagers. During college, he won over $30,000 playing on the pro tour of a card game called Magic: The Gathering. In 2001, Dominic co-founded Protospiel, an annual convention of game designers which focuses on a European design style that is growing in popularity.

Upon graduating from the MBA program at the University of Maryland in 2004, Crapuchettes founded a board game company called North Star Games with $10,000 in seed capital. Their flagship product, Wits & Wagers, has gone on to win more awards than any party game in history. It is now available at Target, Wal-Mart, Toys-R-Us, Barnes & Noble, the Xbox, and 13 European countries. Previously, Dominic spent 12 seasons working as a captain of a commercial fishing vessel in Alaska, 3 years as a programmer at an internet company, and 2 years as a consultant to entrepreneurs.

Shawn DuBravac

REINVENTING Consumer Technology

Shawn DuBravac is the Chief Economist and Director of Research for the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), the preeminent trade association promoting growth in the $186 billion U.S. consumer electronics industry. DuBravac provides crucial economic analysis to association and industry leaders regarding future economic activity and the relative health of the technology industry. He also contributes research into technology trends that underpin the industry and was the primary driver of the industry’s new smartphone index, developed in partnership with NASDAQ, and the CE consumer confidence index, in partnership with CNET.

DuBravac has been widely published on the topics of finance, economics and technology. His keen insights regarding the economic drivers of the global consumer electronics industry have made him a highly sought-after speaker and commentator. DuBravac travels both internationally and domestically to meet with tech industry leaders and make presentations about technology and the economy. In addition, his analysis has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Financial Times, the Los Angeles Times, Barron’s, CNN, MSNBC and other media outlets.

DuBravac is also an Adjunct Professor in George Washington University’s MBA program and has taught at Mary Washington University and in George Mason University’s MBA program. Prior to joining CEA, DuBravac was head research analyst in the Economic Analysis Group of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division. He holds economic degrees from Brigham Young University and George Mason University.

DuBravac is an active member of a number of professional organizations including the National Association for Business Economics (NABE) where he is on the Board of Directors and the National Business Economic Issues Council (NBEIC). He holds the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation and is on the Board of Directors and currently President of the CFA Society of Washington, DC. In his free time, he volunteers in the community by providing financial education through the Virginia Cooperative Extension.

Ryan Holladay

REINVENTING The Album

Ryan Holladay is one half of the music duo, BLUEBRAIN, along with his brother Hays. Last Spring they released 'The National Mall', the first location-aware album, composed and designed exclusively as an iPhone app. It is the first in a series of location-based compositions, music that shifts as the user traverses a landscape. On October 4th they released 'Listen to the Light' for Central Park in New York City. Bluebrain have been featured in The Washington Post, Engadget, WIRED, Fast Company, NPR's All Things Considered and BCC World Service among others. @BluebrainMusic

Carol Joynt

REINVENTING My Life

Carol Ross Joynt, in addition to being an author, is an Emmy Award-winning network television producer, interviewer, blogger, photographer. She was born in Denver, grew up in Europe, Ohio, and on the East Coast, and lives in Washington, DC. She is host of the popular local talk show, The Q&A Cafe, which she created in 2001. It airs Fridays at 8 p.m. on DC Cable. Carol is also the author of the memoir "Innocent Spouse," published by Crown in May 2011. "Innocent Spouse" was featured in Vogue and on the Today show, as well as a variety of other print and broadcast media. and received enthusiastic reviews. She will be signing copies of her book at TEDxPennQuarter 2011

Carol hosted TEDxPennQuarter in 2010.

Kat Koppett & Geoff Tarson

REINVENTING Performance

Kat Koppett is the co-director of The Mop & Bucket company, a NY State-based improvisational theatre company, and the Eponymous Founder of Koppett + Company, a consultancy specializing in applying the principles and techniques of improv to enhance individual and group performance anywhere. Her book on the subject, Training to Imagine is considered a seminal work in the field, and she is proud to be a founding member of the Applied Improv Network. Kat has worked with bankers, physicians, engineers, animators, teachers, attorneys, and troubled youth in places ranging from India to Brazil to Paris to Oklahoma. 1n 1995, TheatreWeek Magazine named Kat one of the Year's Unsung Heroes for her invention of the musical improv format Spontaneous Broadway® which is now performed around the world.

Geoff Tarson is an actor, writer and teacher who has performed in theatres across the country and was a television comedy writer in Hollywood for ten years. His writing credits include "Suddenly Susan" and "That's So Raven" as well as selling a pilot recently to Disney Channel.

Geoff has been an improviser for over twenty years, working with some of the best improv talent in the country, including Wayne Brady, Michael McShane, Fred Willard and Kat Koppett, whom he met at Freestyle Rep in New York in the early nineties. Geoff also taught improv at Acme Comedy Theatre and at Los Angeles Theatresports.

He believes the world of television writing is quite similar to the corporate world: pitching ideas, being willing to adjust one's tactics to make a sale, trying to stay current as the marketplace changes, and often dealing with executives who have no sense of humor. His corporate training experience includes Eli Lilly, Charles Schwab and Western Union.

Jimmy Lynn

REINVENTING Sports Media

Jimmy Lynn is the founder and managing partner of JLynn Associates, a global strategic advisory firm focused on sports-related media, marketing, and retail for a diverse set of clients including teams, athletes, leagues and associations, media outlets and other businesses.

Previously, Lynn served as Vice-President, Strategic Development and Partnerships at AOL, where he and his team were responsible for the strategic development and account management of AOL Sports’ strategic partnerships and organizations including the NFL, NBA, NASCAR, MLB, WNBA, NHL, PGA Tour, ABC Sports, CBS Sports, HBO Sports, Sports Illustrated, Turner Sports, NFL Players Association, WWF, The Sporting News, STATS, SportsTicker, etc. During his 14-year career at AOL, he was also instrumental in developing AOL Sports into one of the leading global sports destination internet sites. He also served as a Vice-President, Diversity Partnerships and Strategic Relationships for AOL's Office of Diversity and Inclusion, where he managed AOL's employee affinity networks and partnerships with community service organizations

Additionally, Lynn serves on the Board of Directors for countless charities and is recognized for his outstanding leadership and many accomplishments in voluntary public service, human rights and/or equal opportunity efforts. He is on the Advisory Council of the Asian & Pacific Islander American Scholarship Fund, the Capitol Movement Project and the Leadership Council of George Washington University’s Department of Tourism and Hospitality Management. In 2010, he received an award from Washington, DC Mayor Fenty for outstanding community service.

Lynn is a full-time faculty member of Georgetown University's Sports Industry Management graduate program, as well as member of the Adjunct Faculty at the McDonough School of Business. He has a B.A. in Public Communication and an M.B.A. in Marketing from American University.

Jess McMullin

REINVENTING Government

Jess is the founder of the Centre for Citizen Experience, a startup “do tank” dedicated to advancing design innovation to improve public sector service delivery and policy making.

Based in Edmonton, Alberta, Jess works with public sector clients across North America to design services, systems and policies that make a difference in the daily lives of citizens. He also partners with clients to increase their own design competency, change organizational culture and use design as an important and untapped way to help make the right decisions faster.

Jess also works with private sector clients in order to bring new learning, ideas and experiences from industry to public service.

He is active in the user experience, design and innovation communities. He cofounded the Overlap innovation retreat, started Canux, the Canadian User Experience Workshop, and regularly writes and speaks about the importance of design for understanding and improving the citizen experience as well as teaching hands-on workshops.

You can find out more about Jess and his work at citizenexperience.com or twitter.com/jessmcmullin.

David Kord Murray

REINVENTING Business

Dave began his career as an aerospace engineer. He worked on the Space Shuttle and the conceptual development team of the International Space Station. Over the years he’s been a scientist, chief marketing officer, entrepreneur, CEO, product development specialist, software programmer and line manager for both small and large organizations. He was the Head of Innovation at the software company Intuit. And he started his own online tax preparation company that he sold to H&R Block a few years ago. Just recently, Dave published his first book called Borrowing Brilliance: The Six Steps to Business Innovation by Building on the Ideas of Others. It’s been a Wall Street Journal best seller and named by Inc Magazine as one of the Best Business Books of 2009. BusinessWeek called Dave’s innovation process “one that actually seems to work.”

Dave’s second book is being released in September and is called Plan B: How to Hatch a Second Plan that’s Always Better than the First. It’s about the implementation and evolution of an innovative idea.

Rory Pullens

REINVENTING Education

Having joined Duke Ellington School of the Arts as CEO in January of 2006, Mr. Pullens has brought extraordinary vision, a greater sense of community, and unwavering enthusiasm to the school. A writer, producer, and script-editor before entering the world of education as a theater and journalism teacher and, later, administrator, Mr. Pullens’ career has taken him from Hollywood to the Los Angeles Arts Academy to Nashville Schools to an entertainment company and, most recently, the Denver School of the Arts (DSA). At DSA, Mr. Pullens served as Principal Director of the Arts, supervising ten art majors, the arts curriculum, recruitment, the audition/selection process, and the performance calendar, as well as fundraising and marketing.

Vijay Ravindran

REINVENTING The Newspaper

Vijay Ravindran joined The Washington Post Company as senior vice president and chief digital officer in February 2009. In his role, Ravindran focuses on digital news product development. Ravindran founded and leads WaPo Labs, which develops experimental news products, including the personalized news aggregation site Trove. Ravindran also serves in various leadership roles at SocialCode (the leading Facebook-dedicated advertising agency), The Washington Post’s online initiatives, Slate, Avenue100 Solutions (a leading analytics-based performance marketing company), and Ongo (a Company investment).

Previously, as chief technology officer of Catalist LLC, a start-up political technology company that built a national voter database and data mining tools for political campaigns, Ravindran led all the technology aspects of developing the company’s software products. He joined Catalist at its inception in late 2005. During the 2008 election cycle, Catalist clients included the Obama for America and Hillary Clinton presidential campaigns.

Prior to Catalist, Ravindran was a technology director at Amazon.com. From 2003 to 2005, he led the ordering services group; the department was responsible for consumer purchasing on all Amazon properties. This included the product development and operations for “Shopping Cart,” “Checkout,” “1-Click” and “Your Account,” as well as the initial creation and management of “Amazon Prime.” From 2001 to 2003, he built and led the teams that owned the core order-processing and identity services for Amazon and its partners. Ravindran joined Amazon in 1998 as a software engineer. Prior to Amazon, Ravindran was a software developer at American Management Systems in Fairfax, VA, and Dusseldorf, Germany.

Ravindran graduated from the University of Virginia with a BS in systems engineering. He is a member of the board of directors of the Alliance for Excellent Education.

Damian Saccocio

REINVENTING The Research University

Damian is a something of a nerd-gone-astray -- while working toward his computer engineering degree as a young Buckeye, he correctly observed his relative lack of skills in VAX VMS DCL compared to peers so wrote a thesis on "red apples" that told the story of the Soviet Union's long standing policy of appropriating western technology; this led to a master's in political science from MIT where he focused not so much on how to build bridges as it were but where they should be built and their impact; these bridges turned into information superhighways and brought him to DC where he was privileged to work on technology policy issues of great importance at the National Research Council long before most folks thought they were important. Missing the freedom that comes with being poor, Damian went back to graduate school and earned a doctorate in Management from Rensselaer Poytechnic Institute (the nation's first, after West Point, engineering school which was founded to help train civil engineers for the communication/commerce pathways of the time, canals).

Upon returning to DC, Damian began a decade with AOL which began with 28.8 baud modems and ended with streaming video over broadband—talk about disruptive technology! He's particularly excited about the current, if slow, revolution in watching (and interacting with) moving images over long distances (aka TV) and has worked with the "free-space" motion controller folks at Hillcrest Labs and the media backend system folks at Artesia (now Open Text). He is currently a Director with the Advisory Group at Huron where he advises universities on how best to connect the dots between research, faculty, and students with the broader innovation ecosystem of companies, investors, and customers. In his spare time he enjoys watching the Rugby World Cup and wrestling with his three kids.

Kes Sampanthar

REINVENTING The Mind

As Director of Media Strategy at Cynergy, Kes Sampanthar is responsible for leading the charge into the Media and Entertainment industry. Additionally, he is Founder and Director of Innovation for Metamemes where he has created a new innovation tool called ThinkCube.

Kes is an entrepreneur, inventor, computer scientist and consultant. He has more than 15 years experience in the technology industry, specializing in internet and software architecture. He is an award winning innovator and is recognized as a strategic thinker and consultant to some of the biggest names in the Fortune 500.

Kes attended TEDActive2010 where he experienced four days of gripping talks and engrossing workshops. Fueled by the creativity and passion he encountered, he left inspired to carry on the tradition of "Ideas Worth Spreading."

Watch Kes's talk from 2010.

Bill Smith

REINVENTING Social Marketing

Bill worked for more than 30 years trying to figure out how to help masses of people make positive change in their lives. He designed and managed programs around the world focused on combating infant diarrhea, immunizing children, saving the environment, and reducing obesity. He wrote a couple of books; received a set of awards and now he consults and speaks widely on lessons he learned after 30 years of imperfect, but interesting work. His field is social marketing, not social media, but the application of basic marketing principles to programs that make difficult change fun, easy, and popular to adopt. In "Let's Get Naked", he'll show us how a simple idea can change the way you think and act.

Senator John Sununu

REINVENTING Political Life

John E. Sununu is Senior Fellow at PWC and Senior Policy Advisor at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. He represented New Hampshire in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1997 to 2003, and in the U.S. Senate from 2003 to 2009. In the Senate he served on the Commerce, Finance, Banking and Foreign Relations committees, writing the Patriot Act Amendments of 2005, and the Internet Tax Freedom Act of 2007. He led delegations monitoring the Palestinian Presidential Elections in 2005, and Lebanese Parliamentary elections in 2009. From 2008-2009, Sununu served on the Congressional Oversight Panel for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, and currently serves as a Director of Time Warner Cable and Boston Scientific. He writes a weekly column for the Boston Globe. Prior to his election to Congress he worked for emerging high-tech firms as an engineer, a strategy consultant and a chief financial officer. He earned a B.S. and M.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Adam Wade

REINVENTING Storytelling

Adam Wade is originally from New Hampshire, and has been performing in New York City for the past ten years. He is a record 17-time StorySlam Champion at The Moth ("New York's hottest and hippest literary ticket" by The Wall Street Journal), and a two-time GrandSLAM Champion (2006, 2009). He’s been profiled in Time Out New York Magazine's Comedy Section. The magazine also named him to their 'Best of 2009 List' in the Most promising young talents category.

"The tales are a little sweet, a little sad, and okay, a lot of them depict failing with girls. But underneath brims an unfaltering self-confidence; he believes in the power of being a good egg."
– Jane Borden, Time Out New York

Adam has made television appearances on Comedy Central, Late Night with Conan O’Brien, ESPN and TV Land. He’s written for the New York Times, the New York Press and Glamour Magazine. For the past two years he’s taught Storytelling classes at NYC's Magnet Theater. For more information, go to: adamwade.com.

Rob Wilder

REINVENTING A Mission

Rob Wilder is the CEO and co-founder of ThinkFoodGroup (TFG), the management company responsible for the daily operations of Washington’s landmark restaurants Café Atlántico, minibar by josé andrés, Zaytinya, Oyamel and Jaleo. In addition, the company oversees Los Angeles’ four star dining destination the Bazaar by José Andrés as well as three new restaurants at the recently opened The Cosmopolitan at Las Vegas: China Poblano, Jaleo and é by José Andrés. TFG also handles José Andrés’ additional creative endeavors encompassing cookbooks, television programming, concept consulting, and new restaurant projects.

In 1993, Wilder joined forces with Washington-based restaurateur Roberto Alvarez and Chef José Andrés to launch and operate the first Jaleo, Washington’s fun-spirited Spanish tapas restaurant located downtown in Penn Quarter. In 2001, came the opening of the second Jaleo in Bethesda, Maryland, and then the Mediterranean-inspired, Zaytinya in October 2002. In 2003, Zaytinya captured the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington’s New Restaurant of the Year and was nominated for Best New Restaurant in the US by the James Beard Foundation. Conde Nast Traveler included Zaytinya on its list of “Hottest” restaurants in the world, and Washingtonian named Zaytinya the “Best New Restaurant” in Washington. Wilder and his partners next opened the critically acclaimed minibar by josé andrés, a six-seat restaurant within a restaurant, Café Atlantico. A third Jaleo and a small plates Mexican concept restaurant, Oyamel, soon followed in Crystal City in 2004. In 2006, the award-winning restaurant group was rechristened ThinkFoodGroup. In the fall of 2008, ThinkFoodGroup partnered with sbe and designer Philippe Starck opened the SLS at Beverly Hills opened in the fall of 2008 and is home to the four star The Bazaar by José Andrés. Esquire magazine named The Bazaar the “Best New Restaurant of 2009” and GQ magazine chose it as a top ten for 2009. SLS recently announced their next location in Miami. SLS South Beach is scheduled to open in 2012. In 2009 TFG partnered with one of DC’s premiere caterers to create José Andrés Catering with Ridgewells and in the fall of 2010 were awarded the contract to manage food service at Arena Stage in Washington. Rob and José were also awarded the Richard Melman Award from Restaurant Hospitality in recognition their exciting and relevant restaurant concepts.

An honors graduate from both Yale University and The New York Restaurant School, Wilder began his career in the restaurant industry over 20 years ago when he co-founded Amy’s Ice Creams, Inc., a chain of retail ice cream stores based in Austin, Texas. He then went on to create the original Austin Grill restaurant in 1988, and expanded the company to include seven restaurant locations around the Washington/Baltimore area.

Additionally, Rob Wilder serves as President of the Penn Quarter Neighborhood Association, Director of RAMW and the Downtown DC Business Improvement District and has served as Board Member of DC Central Kitchen, Beauvoir School and as Chapter Chair of the US Capital Chapter of the Young Presidents Organization (YPO). Rob lives in Bethesda with his wife and two children.

Derek Brown

REINVENTING Cocktails

Derek M. Brown is a beverage expert whose passion for cocktails, spirits, and classic bartending has led him to be a leading voice in the new cocktail renaissance. Derek has developed celebrated beverage programs as a bartender and sommelier at Washington D.C.’s finest bars and restaurants, including The Gibson. His latest project is a cocktail club and laboratory called the Columbia Room, housed within the bar that he co-owns with his brother, The Passenger. Derek also owns Better Drinking, where he conducts seminars and events and entertains drinkers throughout the country. Derek has received numerous accolades for his bartending, teaching and wine stewardship, including “Sommelier of the Year” for 2008 by DC Modern Luxury magazine, one of the five top new sommeliers in the country for 2007 by Wine & Spirits magazine and “Bartender of the Year” for 2009 by Washington City Paper.

He has appeared in a diverse array of publications and media including the Rachel Maddow Show, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, USA Today, Food & Wine and Details magazine. Robert Messenger wrote in the Weekly Standard, “To watch Brown at work behind the bar is to see an artist among his elements….” While he routinely holds classes and events through Better Drinking, this past Christmas he was specifically honored when invited to the White House to mix cocktails during the First Family’s holiday parties. When Derek is not behind the bar he is on the board of directors for the Museum of the American Cocktail, mixology chair for Taste of The Nation D.C. and a proud member of the D.C. Craft Bartenders Guild.

Watch Derek's talk.

Seaton Smith

REINVENTING the Black Comedian

Applying smooth charisma to a layer of explosive energy, topped off with unforgettable characters sure to permanently reside in your brain, Seaton Smith leaves his audience in a state of comedic euphoria as he killed performing on Opie and Anthony “Virus” tour and the “New Faces” show at Just For Laughs Comedy Festival in Montreal. He also is a online phenom signing a deal with Sierra Mist where he was able to showcase his chops at producing the skit “Pimpin Referee.” And he’s a YouTube favorite with his popular webseries, Annoy Charlie Smith Inc.

Watch Seaton's talk.

Rohit Bhargava

REINVENTING Marketing

Rohit is a founding member of the 360 Digital Influence group at Ogilvy and author of the best selling new book Personality Not Included, a guide on how to use personality to reinvent your marketing that has been published globally in 8 languages. He writes the Influential Marketing blog, ranked by AdAge among the top 50 marketing blogs in the world, and has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, PBS, SkyNews, MarketingChina and Fast Company. Rohit teaches Global Communications at Georgetown University and is a frequent and “non-obvious” keynote speaker on marketing and business at events around the world.

Watch Rohit's talk.

Bram Weinstein

REINVENTING Sports Media

Bram Weinstein joined ESPN in May 2008 as an ESPNEWS anchor. ESPNEWS is the nation’s only all-sports news network, providing extensive highlights along with in-depth analysis, breaking news and press conferences.

Before joining ESPN, he worked at Redskin Radio in Washington, D.C., where he served as a host and reporter from 2006 to 2008. From 1999 to 2006, he hosted his own sports talk show and was a sports reporter with WTEM-AM in Washington, D.C. Prior to that, he served as a reporter and weekend anchor with KHAS-TV in Hastings, Neb., from 1996 to 1998. He began his career at CNN in Washington as a reporter from 1995 to 1996. In 2002, Weinstein was honored by the Washington, D.C. Achievement in Radio Awards as Best Sports Reporter for his coverage on Sportstalk 980. Weinstein is a native of Silver Spring, Md. He graduated from American University in 1995 with a bachelor’s degree in broadcast journalism.

Watch Bram's talk.

David Armano

REINVENTING Social Media

As Senior Vice President for Edelman Digital, David applies his expertise in social media, marketing and business strategy across multiple clients such as eBay, BlackBerry, and PepsiCo to name a few. A global resource, Armano also leads the strategic effort behind the Edelman Digital site and has been working in the digital medium since 1997.

David is considered to be a highly influential voice on the subject of social media for business and has over 50,000 combined subscribers to his blog (Logic + Emotion) and Twitter stream. Logic + Emotion has consistently ranked in the top 20 marketing blogs according to the Ad Age Power 150. Prior to Edelman, David was a part of the founding team of Dachis Group where he helped communicate the vision for social business design while doing groundbreaking strategic work for clients including Intuit.

Prior to Dachis Group, David worked in the digital agency space for over 10 years with organizations such as P&G, HP, WW Grainger, Allstate, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Fifth Third Bank. His work on Grainger helped the company earn the reputation of best commerce site according to BtoB magazine and his leadership on HP resulted in a Webaward. David was also a key member of the joint Omnicom “swat team” consisting of TBWA, Critical Mass, and 180 working collaboratively to pitch and win global digital responsibilities for Adidas.

He also writes regular industry perspectives for the Harvard Business Review, and is best known for his distinct brand of visual thinking, which can be found both on the Web and in presentations all over the world. David studied visual communications/computer graphics and graduated cum laude from Pratt Institute, where he was mentored under some of the brightest minds in the industry.

Watch David's talk.

Austin Kleon

REINVENTING Poetry

Austin Kleon is a writer, cartoonist, designer, and visual thinker obsessed with the art of communicating with pictures and words, together. He’s probably best known for his Newspaper Blackout Poems—poetry made by redacting words from newspaper articles with a permanent marker. His first book, Newspaper Blackout, was released by Harper Perennial in April 2010. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife, Meghan.

Watch Austin's talk.

Christopher McDougall

REINVENTING Running

Christopher McDougall is a former war correspondent for the Associated Press who reported from Rwanda, Angola and the Congo. A three-time National Magazine Award finalist, he has written for Esquire and The New York Times Magazine. While on an unrelated assignment in Mexico, he happened upon the Tarahumara Indians, a reclusive tribe that preserves the ancient human art of super-long distance running. McDougall described his time among the Tarahumara, and his own transformation from broken-down ex-runner into an ultra-marathoner, in his New York Times bestseller, Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Super Athletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen. He now does his own running among the Amish farms around his home in rural Pennsylvania, usually barefoot.

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Julian Mulvey

REINVENTING The Political Campaign

Julian Mulvey is a Democratic media consultant with a reputation for creative political communication on television and online. He has won 14 Pollie Awards from the American Association of Political Consultants and the Visionary Award from the D.C. Independent Film Festival. His TV ads focus on authenticity, emotion and compelling storytelling. In November of 2006 his clients’ won seven of the eight races he consulted on, including a victory with the largest Democratic vote swing (+86%) of any Congressional race in America. He is a partner at Devine Mulvey.

In 2004 Julian won the Gold Pollie for Best Democratic Congressional TV Ad. That same year he was the media consultant for Charlie Dooley, an African-American candidate running for St. Louis County Executive. Dooley’s election to the 82% white county was called an “historic victory” by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

A year later Julian’s TV ads for Iraq war veteran Paul Hackett caught national attention when the campaign caused a near spectacular upset in Ohio’s ruby-red Second District. Dan Balz of The Washington Post called the ads “very effective.” Roll Call called it “a feat of historic proportion,” and the race became a case study of the blogosphere’s new influence in politics and the birth of a new breed of tough Democratic candidates.

Julian’s interest in politics and the internet began in 1993 as a research assistant to the National Information Infrastructure Project at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard. An early pioneer of online viral media, he produced “Social Insecurity” for the DNC that was downloaded nearly one million times in its first 24 hours. A year later he produced “Lord of the Right Wing” which was seen by over 6 million people online.

Julian first met Tad Devine, his business partner at Devine Mulvey, while studying American politics at Boston University. After five years producing C-SPAN’s morning show, he joined the firm Shrum, Devine, Donilon, where he helped produce ads for Senators Nelson, Corzine, and Dayton, as well as former U.S. House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt to name a few clients.

He was named one of Washingtonian magazine’s “People to Watch 2005,” and a Campaigns & Elections “Rising Star” for 2006. The Washington Post wondered in a headline if Julian had produced “The Best Ad of 2006?” for a spot he made for Chris Carney (Julian likes to think that it was, and Chris now serves in Congress). His first play, Rush’s Dream, about the feud and friendship of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams was performed in SoHo, NY, to sold-out audiences in the summer of 2004.

Born in America, Julian grew up in England, but international clients have taken him back across the Atlantic a few times to work in The Hague, Ireland and Ukraine.

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Shevaun Voisin

REINVENTING "The Self"

Shevaun Voisin is not the titles she holds, the awards she’s won, or even the sum total of her net worth statement. She is a woman on a mission to inspire others to re-invent themselves, achieve in quantum leaps, and choose to be remarkable every day. She has promoted a world ranked boxer, built a mall, taught hundreds of entrepreneurs how to start and grow their companies, and interviewed some of the world’s most accomplished leaders. But, none of these experiences have compared to dancing intimately with death and grief; an encounter that served as the catalyst to publish her international business magazine, MOTIVATED. Challenging widely accepted beliefs about pursing a life of mediocre success versus passionate significance, readers appreciate the truths shared directly from leaders around our world.

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Jake Glover

REINVENTING Physical Education

Jake Glover began his career in health and wellness almost a decade ago as a clinical exercise specialist that focused on gait training strategies for individuals recovering from stroke or brain trauma. He has published numerous articles on the use of adaptive training strategies and physiological data to improve fitness in traditional rehabilitation settings.

After being inspired by a pediatric stroke victim, Jake became a certified high school physical educator eventually creating one of the first state-certified AP Anatomy and Physiology curricula in the country. The curriculum design prepared students for a nationally accredited personal training certification with a job placement program that included community wellness counseling. One of his inner-city programs utilized a high-school mentorship program to reduce the district’s middle-school obesity rate by 46% over two-years and featured his award winning “Anatomy Rap.” Jake was then recruited to run the cardiac rehab and youth physical activity research for the Polar Scholar Master’s Program in Grundy Center, Iowa. In this role, he worked with a graduate team to collect heart-rate based physical activity and biometric data on every student in the town for a full calendar year.

After completing his work in Iowa, Glover served as lead author or grant administrator for multiple state and federal community grant initiatives that featured technology-based data collection and curriculum innovations. He raised more than two-million dollars in public and private funding for school-based wellness programs in 13 different states before becoming the Director of Health and Wellness Initiatives for America’s Health Insurance Plans in Washington, D.C. in 2009.

He now specializes in wellness-focused benefit design and disease management strategies for individual and group health care markets. Jake can be heard weekly on his AHIP Wellness Podcast series interviewing health care executives, fitness celebrities, and public officials on modern wellness and prevention strategies.

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Frank Lantz

REINVENTING Gaming

Frank Lantz is the Creative Director and co-Founder of Area/Code, a New York based developer that creates cross-media, location-based, and social network games. He has worked in the field of game development for the past 20 years. Before starting Area/Code, Frank worked on a wide variety of games as the Director of Game Design at Gamelab, Lead Game Designer at Pop & Co, and Creative Director at R/GA Interactive.

Frank is currently the Interim Director of the NYU Game Center. For over 12 years, Frank has taught game design at NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program. He has also taught at the School of Visual Arts, and Parsons School of Design. His writings on games, technology and culture have appeared in a variety of publications.

Over the past 8 years, Frank helped pioneer the genre of large-scale realworld games, working on projects such as the Big Urban Game, which turned the cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul into the world’s largest boardgame; ConQwest, which featured the first major application of semacodes in the United States, PacManhattan, a life-size version of the arcade classic created by the students in his Big Games class at NYU, and many other experiments in pervasive and urban gaming.

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Anne McCrossan

REINVENTING The Organization

Anne’s a specialist in organizational and brand development, a speaker, author and the founder of Visceral Business. She wrote the Changethis manifesto ‘Cracking the Genetic Code: A New Way Forward for Organizations’ and is shifting the way businesses develop, biologically instead of mechanically, so they can work indigenously with stakeholders and audiences and thrive in the semantic age.

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Angela Lussier

REINVENTING Work

Angela Lussier is a speaker, author, and is leading the Anti-Resume Revolution. She is REINVENTING the way people view work by spreading the word to stop waiting, and start creating. She says success isn’t about talent, it’s about courage.

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Kim Scheinberg

REINVENTING Angel Investing

Kim Scheinberg is a writer, editor, angel investor and philanthropist. She is an enabler, encouraging people to explore and refine their thoughts, often uncovering talents that they didn’t know they had, and helping them exploit the ones that they already recognize.

Kim believes that by intervening in the lives of people who are changing the world, she can accelerate the creation of a sustainable future. As the founder of the Presumed Abundance fund, Kim brings new meaning to the phrase “investing in people.”

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Bill Rasmussen

REINVENTING Combat Medicine

Mr. William Rasmussen is the Founder and Director of Product Development for Beta Centauri Project LLC. He is a Board Certified Respiratory Therapy Technician and Emergency Medical Technician. Most of his training comes from serving in the US Navy as a Respiratory Therapist, as well as General Duty and FMF Corpsman with the Marines. He is now serving with the US Army Reserves as Lead Combat Medic with the 806th Route Clearance Company at Camp Leatherneck in the Kandahar Province of Afghanistan. This is his 3rd overseas combat deployment in his 27 years with the military, including Desert Shield/Desert Storm onboard USS Iwo Jima. He has a wife and 4 children back home in Northern Colorado.

While assigned to a Washington DC Guard Unit in 2005, Rasmussen participated in Hurricane Katrina Recovery at NAS New Orleans the day after it made landfall. In 2006, he was deployed to COB Speicher with the 1041 Engineering Company as a gunner performing convoy missions throughout Iraq. On returning, he was transferred to the Army Reserves and assigned to the medical section, 244th Engineering Battalion.

His experience includes all phases of respiratory critical care, including Burn, Trauma, Cardiac, and Neonatal. He is the developer of the 10ALS concept, which is a system for evaluating the field needs of 1 medic with little resources to care for 10 advanced life support patients. Bill also developed the ALF Ventilator, a respiratory support device that is chemically operated and has only one moving part; making it smaller, more nimble and operable in the absence of infrastructure.

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Chris Bernard

REINVENTING Visual Design

Chris Bernard is a user experience evangelist for Microsoft, whose passion is working with the software design, development and business domains to communicate Microsoft’s position on the importance of user experience in software design.

Chris likes to focus mostly on motion graphic and interactive design but these days he find himself usually working on transactional Web-based applications and design specification artifacts. As a design professional, Chris’s mission is to apply the principles of contextual research, cultural, human, physical and social factors to the products, services and systems that he develops.

Chris is passionate about linking the value of design to business and measurable objectives and does not like people that think designers are merely decorators or designers that act like decorators.

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Kes Sampanthar

REINVENTING User Experience

As Director of Media Strategy at Cynergy, Kes Sampanthar is responsible for leading the charge into the Media and Entertainment industry. Additionally, he is Founder and Director of Innovation for Metamemes where he has created a new innovation tool called ThinkCube.

Kes is an entrepreneur, inventor, computer scientist and consultant. He has more than 15 years experience in the technology industry, specializing in internet and software architecture. He is an award winning innovator and is recognized as a strategic thinker and consultant to some of the biggest names in the Fortune 500.

Kes attended TEDActive2010 where he experienced four days of gripping talks and engrossing workshops. Fueled by the creativity and passion he encountered, he left inspired to carry on the tradition of "Ideas Worth Spreading."

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