Natalie A. Johnson was named manager of Social Media of General Motors Global Technology Group in February 2007. Prior to her current position, she was the Internal Communications manager of GM’s Latin America, Africa and Middle East (LAAM) region, a role she assumed after working as the associate manager for e-business in LAAM.

A native of South Florida, Johnson holds a bachelor’s degree in Business and a MS in Communications with emphasis in Interactive New Communication Technologies from The Florida State University. She joined GM in April of 2002 with the Vehicle Sales Service and Marketing group in LAAM.

Michael has more than twenty years’ experience in corporate communications and technology marketing in Europe and North America. His daily life is a well-balanced mixture of cat-herding, story-telling, and corporate bullet-catching.

He has worked both on the agency side and in small and large tech companies, acting as head of marketing and/or external communications counsel to a wide range of technology, corporate, financial services and public sector clients, including: Accenture, AOL Canada, Borland, Compaq, CNW Group, eBay.ca, H&R Block, Intel, itemus, Lotus, MDS, Sharp Canada, Travelocity,ca, and many others.

At Thornley Fallis, Michael’s role is to help clients make better connections with all of their audiences by combining, where appropriate, traditional and social media campaign elements.

In former roles, Michael led worldwide marketing for a large publicly-traded technology firm, was part of a team that took a software startup from zero to IPO in nine months, and ran the national technology and corporate practice groups for two of the world’s largest public relations agencies.

Recognized as a pioneer in social media, Michael has been an active blogger since early 2001 and is an active consultant on the integration of social media approaches within mainstream public relations. His personal blog, at http://michaelocc.com, was selected as one of the Top 10 Corporate Marketing Blogs worldwide.

Check it out - Thurs Keynotes and Panelist interviews

We’ve got more stuff coming at you from meshTV. Some of really insightful answers from Thursday’s keynotes: Lane Merrifield (Club Penguin) and Garrett Camp (StumbleUpon). Also, some of the action from the hot-spot of any unconference: the halls! We talked to people from CBC, CTV, Digg, OurFaves.com, U of Kansas, U of T, blip.tv. And if you want to subscribe to the meshTV channel to keep getting all the new episodes, go to the iTunes Store. That’s right…meshTV is now up in the Podcast section of the iTunes store. Thanks to the gang at mDialog for getting us in there so quickly.

Wednesday Keynotes and meshU

Hey everyone. Mark McKay here. You can check out some of the best parts of today’s keynotes here. We’ve got Ethan Kaplan, from Warner Bros, answering really interesting questions about the value of various forms of distribution of music and alternative business models to replace the traditional sales. And going up shortly is highlights of the keynote with Michael Geist, law professor at U of Ottawa, discussing digital advocacy. Also, don’t miss checking out all the latest from meshU, the informative day of workshops which happened yesterday.

Welcome to meshTV

Hey everyone my name is Mark McKay. I won the video prize last year at mesh and made a bunch of videos for the guys highlighting all the great things that happened at the conference. This year I’m back and I’ll be at mesh and meshU creating something we’re calling meshTV. I’m working with mDialog, a really awesome high-rez video hosting service, and together we’ll be bring you the best moments from the keynotes, workshops and all the debates and insights that make mesh such an awesome event.I also want to quickly remind you to pack your video cameras so that you can contribute to meshTV and the mesh Channel on mDialog and iTunes. And don’t forget to check back here for new videos and updates to meshTV. Here is a quick video I made to kick things off. See you next week!

Kevin is Vice President, Royal Bank of Canada, and Managing Director of the RBC Venture Partners group where he oversees North American venture capital and growth equity investments in information technology and financial services made on behalf of RBC. Kevin is also the co-managing partner of the BlackBerry Partners Fund, a mobile applications and services fund anchored by investments from RIM, RBC and Thomson Reuters.

Kevin has a long track record as an entrepreneur and operator in the information technology industry in both Canada and the USA where he developed extensive start-up, growth and turn-around experience. He has held a number of executive positions including Chairman, CEO, CIO, and VP Operations, Business Development, Marketing and Corporate Development. He has founded or been part of the management teams of four venture-backed start-ups including a web-based financial services technology company based in Boston that was incubated by RBC. Kevin began his career as an associate with a leading chartered accounting and management consulting firm.

Kevin sits on the boards of Brickstream, Lumeta, Tacit, Tricipher and Igloo. He also served on the boards of Thor Technologies (acquired by Oracle), iPhrase Technologies (acquired by IBM) and Inea Corp. (acquired by Cartesis), Infobright Inc. and CashEdge. He is Chairman of the Financial Services Venture Capital Alliance and is a Trustee of Toronto Montessori Schools.

In addition to actively managing a venture capital portfolio, Kevin holds an appointment as Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurial Studies at the Schulich School of Business (York University) in Toronto.

Kevin holds the ICD.D designation and is a graduate of the Institute of Corporate Directors’ Corporate Governance College (Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto). He obtained his MBA, with distinction, from York University. He also holds a BA degree in Strategic Studies.

Chris Reid, a twenty year veteran with Yamaha Motor Canada, balances his time between gripping a mouse and a set of handle bars.

His passion for motor sports has spurred a diversified career with-in the Yamaha organization. Motorcycles, ATV’s, snowmobiles and mountain bikes are all weapons of choice and if it has a motor, two wheels or goes fast, Chris has likely made the opportunity to pilot it. On the yang, there is nothing he likes better than spending time on the water aboard his very slow, pontoon boat.

Currently Chris is the national manager for product planning and research at Yamaha. And in this capacity, he works very closely with the engineers in Japan to develop, deliver and market new products to a very demanding, performance minded consumer base. In his ‘spare time’ between overseas trips and board-room sessions, he maintains the Yamaha Sled Talk snowmobile blog. He’s regularly engaged in a wide variety of topics online, speaking frankly with customers while dodging bullets from random shooters both internally and externally.

Currently Sled Talk is the only corporate motor sports blog in Canada providing Yamaha a unique medium in which to engage snowmobile enthusiasts. Chris is somewhat of a social media evangelist working to raise web-2.0 awareness within his highly structured, traditional media focused, corporate world.

John Resig is a JavaScript Evangelist for the Mozilla Corporation and the author of the book “Pro Javascript Techniques.” He’s also the creator and lead developer of the jQuery JavaScript library. He’s currently located in Boston, MA.

Since co-founding the Mozilla project in 1998 at Netscape, Mike has been deeply involved in virtually all aspects of Mozilla, from developing software to guiding project policy.

He brings 15 years of open source experience to his work as Chief Evangelist at the Mozilla Corporation, where he leads a team dedicated to making Mozilla understandable and approachable for people all over the world.

Mike lives in Toronto with his wife and cat, when he’s not travelling to bring the Mozilla story to a global audience.

Jenny Bullough is the Manager of Digital Content & Interactivity for the Internet and Digital Division of Harlequin Enterprises Ltd. Her role focuses on establishing Harlequin as a leader in digital publishing for women by creating digital-only product, innovatively leveraging Harlequin’s significant backlist into digital formats, engaging readers with Harlequin brands using emerging and established social media and digital media tools, and using social media to find and develop new authors.

As General Manager of Arts & Crafts, Kieran plays a key role in the development of some of Canada’s leading independent artists. He is responsible for all aspects of sales and marketing in Canada and the U.S. for the entire artist roster. In addition, Kieran handles music licensing, contracts and is actively forging new deals in the digital world. He serves as manager to Jason Collett, calling on a wealth of industry knowledge and business savvy to provide guidance in all aspects of the artist’s career.

Prior to joining Arts & Crafts, Kieran spent six years at Sony BMG Music Canada as Manager, Artist Marketing. In this role, he was responsible for the development and execution of marketing strategies for both domestic and internationally signed artists. Prior to his career in the music industry, Kieran worked as a Consultant within the Strategy practice of Andersen Consulting (Accenture).

Ken Anderson is Assistant Commissioner (Privacy) for the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario. Ken taught privacy law at the University of Ottawa Law School for three years and is a frequent speaker on access and privacy matters. Ken received his law degree from the University of Western Ontario, as well as a degree in business administration from the Ivey School at the University of Western Ontario.

Sam Ladner has ten years’ experience designing and optimizing interactive experiences. She has worked on Canadian media sites including The Globe and Mail Online, Sympatico.ca and Yahoo.ca. She has consulted Fortune 500 companies including Citigroup, Nokia, and Dell on interactive strategy and insight. She is a specialist in qualitative and quantitative research design, including ethnographic observation, web analytics, survey design, and usability testing. She has a PhD in sociology from York University and currently works as Director of Consumer Insights at Blast Radius Inc

Thank you for your interest in mesh. Please direct all press information and interview requests to Megan Hooper at megan.hooper@edelman.com or 416.979.1120 x297.

Accreditation Requirements

All members of the media may apply to become accredited to attend mesh, but, due to space restrictions, the mesh organizing committee has limited accreditation to 10 spots.

While only 10 members of the media may secure accreditation for the full event, media can apply to attend select sessions and/or arrange onsite interviews by contacting mesh at info@meshconference.com or Megan Hooper at megan.hooper@edelman.com.

Applicants for media accreditation are asked to follow these guidelines:

1. Submit a brief (50-words max.) bio of your accomplishments as a member of the media including the topics covered and the name of the company, blog or other outlet that carries your stories or posts.
2. Include at least three samples or your work as attachments or links.
3. Indicate the size of your audience through supporting material such as the blog or organization’s readership, page views, etc.
4. Outline the topics, people or ideas you are interested in covering or learning about at mesh.
5. Provide a summary of how you plan to cover the event – liveblogging, on-site interviews, post-mesh posts or articles, etc.
6. Include full contact e-mail, phone number and address in case we need to contact you to clarify anything outlined above.
7. Send materials requested above to info@meshconference.com.

Key Dates

April 29, 2008: Accreditation opens for mesh
May 6, 2008: Deadline to submit request for media accreditation
May13, 2008: Deadline for mesh to confirm media accreditation and notify those that have not been accredited.

Terms & Conditions

1. Media accreditation for mesh will be decided based upon the following criteria:
   • Fit of publication to mesh topics and speakers
   • Quality of applicant’s personal output and that of his/her media outlet
   • Audience reach of media outlet(s)
   • Proposed coverage plans that generate maximum exposure for mesh topics
2. Accreditation will be determined at the discretion of the mesh organizing committee based on the above criteria. The mesh organizing committee reserves the right to limit accreditation to applicants who best demonstrate they meet the criteria listed above.
3. At its own discretion, mesh reserves the right to allow limited, temporary access to members of the media during the event itself. This is designed to allow those who do not have full accreditation to interview speakers or attend seminars so they can cover the event.
4. If an applicant would like to guarantee access, all members of the media not accredited are welcome to purchase a ticket while they’re still available.

Sean currently runs a popular blog focused on marketing issues, and was recently named by Advertising Age as one of the “Power150” – a listing of the top 150 marketing bloggers in the world. As Director of Strategy & Innovation at Lift Communications, Sean brings a particular expertise in social media, online marketing, web 2.0 strategies and how context-based engagement marketing can be utilized to overcome the fragmentation of audience attention, interests and time.

Mark is a free-agent consultant who, together with a Toronto-based community of collaborators, is developing an innovative practice applying participatory methodologies and social web technologies to public policy, social change and innovation problems. Mark was a co-organizer of Toronto Transit Camp (February 2007), an experiment in open source civic co-creation and wrote an article on the subject that was published in Harvard Business Review’s HBR List - Breakthrough Ideas for 2008. Mark is a Toronto-based Community Evangelist and blogs at http://remarkk.com.

An innovator and strategist in the Canadian online media industry, Candice is passionate about where the web is headed. Most recently, she has distinguished herself as founder of OurFaves.com, a site which harnesses the power of user-generated content, city search and social networking, allowing users to share and discover local favourites on a city-wide scale. Since its launch in May 2007, traffic has grown tremendously and the site is planned to launch in other cities across North America.

Candice also holds the post of GM of toronto.com – one of Torstar Digital’s most prominent and highly trafficked consumer websites.

Candice was instrumental in the 2005 creation of Torstar Digital, the digital arm of Torstar Media Group. There, in her previous position as Director, Strategy and Corporate Development, she played a key role in the foundation of several start-up ventures and partnerships including Olive Canada Network, which has become one of Canada’s most successful premium online ad networks.

Before joining Torstar, Candice spent four years with the Monitor Group, a top tier strategy consulting firm, acting as consultant to a range of international organizations.

Mic has over fifteen years broad-based experience in working with technology focused companies and has held senior marketing, business development, product or general management roles at Yahoo, Mozilla, CGI, itemus, in her own company - B-Innovative, Inc - and spent her earlier career at McKinsey & Company. Mic is responsible for localization of Firefox at Mozilla across 44 languages. Mic also advises FreshBooks on its strategic, marketing and operations initiatives and supports Innovation in Canada by instigating StartupCamps and various other supportive efforts to promote entrepreneurship and innovation in Canada. When she’s not doing that, she’s also been known to sneak in games of backyard badminton whenever weather permits.

Dmitry is the Co-Founder and Chief Apricot at www.WildApricot.com - membership website platform used by thousands of clubs, associations, communities and non-profits around the world. Wild Apricot is a two year-old SaaS startup created by transforming a web development shop Bonasource Inc. which Dmitry has been running since 2001. His prior experience includes big corporations and several entrepreneurial ventures – some of which flourished and some which were great learning experiences (meaning spectacular failures)

Dmitry is passionate and knowledgeable on the subjects of usability, agile development and crowdsourcing and has been profiled and quoted in The Globe and Mail, Canadian Business Magazine, Computer World Canada, Profit Magazine, National Post, ITBusiness.ca and IT World. He is the Web Chair at the Association of Marketing and Sales (AIMS) Canada and President of Toronto Interacts - Usability Professionals Association.
For more information about Dmitry and Wild Apricot: http://www.wildapricot.com/manifesto.aspx

Austin Hill is a Canadian entrepreneur who has been creating technology start-ups for 15 years. He is co-founder of Montreal technology startups Akoha and Standout Jobs, where he currently serves as CEO (Akoha) and Chairman (Standout Jobs).

Austin was a founder of Zero-Knowledge Systems (renamed Radialpoint in 2002) and as its President helped the company raise $75 million between 1997 and 2001. He also served as Chief Technology Officer and Chief Strategy Officer of Zero-Knowledge Systems, CEO of Synomos Inc. (a Zero-Knowledge Systems subsidiary), and Executive-Vice President of Research for Radialpoint. Radialpoint was honoured by Deloitte & Touche as one of Canada’s fastest-growing technology firms in their 2006 Technology Fast 50 award.

A serial entrepreneur, Austin was a founder of the Internet provider Total.Net in 1994 and built its Canadian network as its Chief Technology Officer. In 1990, while still a teenager, he founded security consulting firm Cyberspace Data Security.

In 2001 Austin was awarded the 2001 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Emerging Entrepreneur in Quebec. In 2002 Austin was named a Technology Pioneer of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Austin is an advisory board member of the Electronic Privacy Information Center and a past Board member of the Information Technology Association of Canada. He serves on the advisory board of the Atwater Library Digital Literacy project, is a research fellow for Coburn Ventures, and through his angel investment firm Brudder Ventures advises a number of Canadian start-ups and entrepreneurs. He is a Board Member of Anges Quebec and a Venture Partner at iNovia Capital.

Austin’s work on the issues of privacy, governance and technologies of social change have been profiled on 60 Minutes, CNN and ABC News and covered in Time, Newsweek, the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. He speaks around the world on the issues of social entrepreneurship, civic society and the technologies of social change, and the role of entrepreneurs and corporations as agents of change in society.

Ryan is an entrepreneur and web advocate who has built two successful web applications; DropSend and Amigo. He also runs web events and workshops, worldwide, that inspire web designers and developers to build their own web applications.

Leah Culver founded Pownce with her friends Kevin Rose and Daniel Burka as a way of sending messages, links, files and events to friends. Leah is the lead developer for the site and spends most of her time working on feature development, fixing bugs, scaling the site, and maintaining the API. She’s a recent computer science graduate from the University of Minnesota and enjoys the challenge of developing a web application from scratch. Leah also writes a blog about her experiences as a software developer at leahculver.com.

Graham Henderson became President of the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) in November 2004.

Prior to joining CRIA, he was Senior Vice-President of Business Affairs and eCommerce at Universal Music Canada. There he had managed Universal’s e-commerce strategy and was instrumental in the launch of Puretracks.com, Canada’s first legal digital music download service.

Graham began his legal career in 1987 at Canada’s largest law firm, McCarthy Tétrault where he became a partner in 1992. In 1993 Graham left McCarthy’s to found his own practice. Graham joined forces with Stephen Stohn and Susan Abramovitch in 1997 to start Stohn Henderson, a law firm which rapidly became the leading entertainment law boutique in Canada. His clients included a veritable who’s who of Canadian music at the time (among them Alannah Myles, Crash Test Dummies, Leahy, Loreena McKennitt, Randy Bachman, The Northern Pikes, The Pursuit of Happiness, Somerset Records and True North Records).

Graham has taught entertainment law at the University of Toronto, where he earned his LL.B, after completing an MA in English Literature. Graham also holds a double major in English Literature and Fine Art History from Guelph University.

Graham lives in Toronto with his wife Margo Timmins of Cowboy Junkies and their son Ed.

The Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) promotes the interests of Canadian record companies and their partners, the artists. CRIA represents more than 95 per cent of all records produced and sold in Canada.




Guinevere Orvis is an Interactive Producer with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s Factual Entertainment division where she leads online and mobile content strategy and production for several prime time television shows. One of these shows, Canada’s Next Great Prime Minister, broke new ground this year by becoming the first prime time show in North America to be released via BitTorrent, DRM-free.

Prior to CBC, she was the team leader for MuchMusic.com at CHUM and producer for several online properties at Alliance Atlantis.

Guinevere is also an entrepreneur who grew a design agency for eight years, a social media evangelist, new media presenter who has covered topics such as blogging and eCommerce to business groups, a five-year blogging veteran and a graduate of York University’s Film & Video degree program. She’s been quoted in The Toronto Star, CNET, BoingBoing and will retire happy when people can watch any show they want online.

She is @Guin on Twitter.

Sylvain joined Edelman Digital last year with 15 years’ experience in marketing, interactive media and telecommunications. As managing director of Edelman Digital Canada, Sylvain is responsible for extending Edelman’s digital capabilities within the network and acts as strategic consultant on interactive services and social media to Edelman clients.

Most recently VP Market Development for Alogient, a web and information systems consulting firm in Montréal, Sylvain’s experience includes a role as Strategic Marketing Director at Kangaroo TV where he spearheaded the company’s launch into Formula One, NASCAR and the NFL and seven years as President and CEO of K-OS, an interactive agency he founded in 1995.

A bright and uniquely authoritative voice on social media and Web 2.0, Amber MacArthur is a journalist, podcaster, and co-founder of MGImedia. Best known as a former TV host at G4TechTV and CityTV’s iconic New Media Specialist, she made her name—and continues to flex her influence and creativity—as a Web consultant and strategist for some of today’s leading companies.

When she’s not reporting on the latest Web trends, Amber is working with companies—including HP, Bell, Microsoft and Adobe—to research, design, implement and monitor them. At the world-famous Razorfish, in San Francisco, she was a strategist for a variety of Web content, branding and usability projects. She was also the Web communications director at HigherMarkets.

Amber now runs her own online strategy company, MGImedia, and works closely with Arktyp, which designed TWiT.tv, one of the first and most influential podcast networks in the world. Recently, she was hired by Tony Robbins to oversee online user experience and video strategy for his new social networking site.
In the burgeoning world of podcasting, she hosts commandN, a weekly video podcast, and co-hosts Inside the Net, an influential weekly audio podcast with tech guru Leo Laporte. She also contributes a regular column to CBC Radio’s Spark. In all of her media work, she talks to the Web’s users, content producers, product makers and social entrepreneurs, taking care to make accessible to viewers this sometimes confounding, ever-changing, and massively-influential world.

Garrett Camp is a co-founder of StumbleUpon, which was acquired by eBay in 2007 for $75-million. He is responsible for StumbleUpon’s product design and strategy, and has guided the company’s design and development since 2001, from inception to over 3.5M members. Garrett completed his Masters in Software Engineering at the University of Calgary, where he researched collaborative systems, evolutionary algorithms and information retrieval.

Maggie Fox, a communications and content expert who has never met a medium she didn’t like, is the founder and CEO of Social Media Group, one of the world’s largest and bestknown agencies helping business navigate the world of Web 2.0.

Over the course of her career, Maggie has lead teams that have marketed, written and produced television and website content for companies like CHUM Limited, the Global Television Network, Do it Best, Deloitte, Sears and Disney. A longtime blogger (and dot-bomb survivor), she’s presently putting her unique experience to work for firms who want to engage their internal and external audiences through social media.

Pioneers in their field, Social Media Group has developed social media strategies for some of the best-known brands in Europe and North America, including Ford Motor Company, SAP, Yamaha Motor, Corbis and Harlequin Publishing. Maggie has also been interviewed about social media by CBC Radio, The Globe and Mail, CTV News, The Toronto Star and Marketing Magazine, among others. She was also recently included in Women Who Risk, a listing of influential women who head up Internet-based firms and is a member of both The Social Media Collective, an invite-only group of “the web’s best thinkers on media, marketing and web 2.0” and the Enterprise Irregulars.

Maggie is frequently asked to speak to business groups across North America about Web 2.0, and sits on the Advisory Board for SMToday Media, which operates the Social Media Collective and MyVenturePad online communities.

David Jones is Vice President, Digital Communications in Hill & Knowlton’s Toronto office where he develops and executes online PR campaigns that connect clients to their stakeholders through blogs, podcasts, social networks and other online engagement opportunities.
David’s broad experience in corporate, financial, food/beverage, packaged goods, sports, events and Internet allow him to successfully introduce online communications strategies to clients across all sectors.

David has held senior communications positions at Molson Canada and the Royal Canadian Golf Association and was the Group Head, Consumer Brands, Fleishman-Hillard Canada before joining Hill & Knowlton. He has also held positions with agencies Edelman, Harbinger and Thornley Fallis.
David has won multiple local, national and international awards for his work with Molson, was managing editor for Golf Canada magazine and managed PR at some of Canada’s major sports and entertainment events.

David holds a journalism degree from Ryerson University in Toronto. He is also the author of a popular PR blog (prworks.ca) and co-host of the top Canadian PR podcast, Inside PR (insidepr.ca). David is the senior judge for the PR category of the Canadian Marketing Association Awards and a founding member of the measurement committee of the Canadian Public Relations Society, where he helped create the MRP measurement system.

David Usher is a Canadian singer songwriter who has sold over 1.3 million records. He has won 5 Junos and has had 11 different songs reach #1 on radio including, The Music in 2007. David is very involved with social media and uses his site Davidusher.com as a place to experiment with social network integration and community development. In his ‘other’ blog, at CloudiD.com, he explores the intersection of art, technology and communications. Through his company CloudiD Media, he is the social media consultant for EMI Music Publishing as well as other music, theatre and dance organizations. David has traveled to Burma for WarChild Canada to film a documentary on children affected by war. He has performed for Fashion Cares and is presently part of the campaign Make Poverty History. In 2007 David was the spokesperson for The Kids Help Phone and he has recently finished a cover version of John Lennon’s Watching the Wheels for Amnesty International.

The first single from David’s new album is due out in July.

Doug Walker has seen the power of viral and word-of-mouth communications first hand. He has conducted a unique experiment to become the world’s leading authority on the subject of Rock Paper Scissors. The experiment was a massive success and led to interviews by hundreds of media outlets including Rolling Stone, CNN, BBC, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and the Today Show to name a few. He is the author of The Official Rock Paper Scissors Strategy Guide (Simon & Schuster, 2004), is the subject of a feature film documentary at the 2007 Calgary International Film Festival (Audience Choice Award) and runs the annual World Championships of Rock Paper Scissors in Toronto.

As the Experiential Marketing Manager at Venture Communications, Doug is responsible for developing the agency’s online and digital practice. Doug is the key client consultant on all matters pertaining to interactive communications.

Prior to joining Venture he spent over twelve years developing and implementing online strategies for some of Canada’s highest profile brands including General Motors, Molson Breweries, IBM, Microsoft, Rogers AT&T and Scotiabank.

Doug also runs RPS Events (www.worldrps.com/events), which provides professionally managed, referee-run rock paper scissors (RPS) networking tournaments at corporate gatherings such as conferences, office parties and other business events. He is a recognized expert on viral, word-of-mouth and social media having spoken at many conferences including Mass to Grass (Toronto) and was a keynote speaker at the 2006 Word of Mouth Marketing Summit in Washington, DC. He is an active participant in Canadian social media circles, co-hosting the Shill Podcast and maintaining the Advertising and Culture Blog webwalker.ca. Recently of Toronto, Doug moved to Calgary, along with his wife Lisa and four-year old daughter Charlotte.

Julia Johnston is the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of mEgo, Inc. (www.mego.com).

mEgo has developed a “portable multimedia profile” that allows users to share dynamic, customized visual representations of themselves across the web. Instead of creating a number of profiles on a variety of social networking sites, users create a “mEgo”, including their profile information and favorite feeds and utilities (YouTube videos, Flickr photos, Amazon.com wish lists etc) and post it to their social networks, blogs and personal web pages. Based in Los Angeles, California, mEgo launched at the TechCrunch40 conference in September of 2007.

Previously, Julia was based in London, U.K. as the Senior Vice President of Business Development for PCCW, the dominant telecommunications company in Hong Kong. Prior to joining PCCW in London, Julia was based in Toronto for the company and was involved in the sale of Gordon Capital Corporation to HSBC in 1999.

Julia spent five years in Hong Kong, with various divisions of the predecessor to PCCW, Pacific Century Group, including STAR TV, the first pan-Asian satellite television service.

Julia is the co-author of “Split Screen – Home Entertainment and the New Technologies” published in 1992 by the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting.

Julia graduated from Princeton University and obtained her law degree from the University of Toronto.

Dr. Paul Kedrosky is a venture capitalist; an analyst for CNBC television; a columnist for TheStreet/RealMoney; the editor of Infectious Greed, one of the best
known blogs on business & finance; and he is frequently quoted in major publications around the world.

• He is strategist for Ten Asset Management, a southern California institutional asset management firm with approximately a billion dollars in assets.
• He is a senior fellow at the $3-billion Kauffman Foundation, where he is focused on entrepreneurship, innovation, and the future of risk capital.
• He is a venture partner with Ventures West, an institutional venture capital firm with more than $600m in assets. In the latter capacity his interests include consumer technologies, media, semiconductors, and life sciences. He sits on the board of various private companies. Earlier in his career, Dr. Kedrosky founded the technology equity research practice at HSBC James Capel. As a highly-ranked technology equity analyst, transactions with which he was involved created in excess of a billion dollars in public market value.
• Dr. Kedrosky has also been a successful entrepreneur. Among other ventures, in 1999 he financed and launched one of the first hosted blogging services, GrokSoup.

Pema is a prolific entrepreneur who has helped launch everything from a Canadian media company to the U.K.’s first Indy Car racetrack.

Pema’s latest challenge has been co-founding GigPark, a Toronto based Web start-up that lets members find services through recommendations from friends. Before GigPark, Pema was the founding editor-in-chief of Dose Magazine, taking the Canadian print and online media brand from a standing start to more than 330,000 daily readers.

Prior to Dose, Pema was an account director for the award-winning Canadian advertising agency, Rethink, and worked at Michealides & Bednash (London), creating content and marketing concepts for some of the UK’s most innovative media brands including Channel 4, XFM Radio and the BBC. Originally from New Zealand, Pema began his career at Young & Rubicam Advertising before starting his own media company, Sonar.

Pema is a compulsive traveler, a part time surfer and has a (sometimes) unhealthy obsession with modern architecture. Fun fact: Pema is Tibetan name. It was given to him by a monk in northern India where his parents lived for nine years.

Jen Evans is a Toronto-based entrepreneur and writer and the president of Sequentia Communications, a customer communications agency ranked as Canada’s 24th (2005) and 27th (2004) fastest growing emerging company by PROFIT magazine. She is the co-chair of the White Ribbon Campaign, a board member of Computer for Schools Ontario and Freeform Solutions, and sits onRedFlagDeals’ and Radiant Core’s advisory boards.

Jen writes a column on business and technology for PCworld.ca and was a contributor to the Globe and Mail’s online tech edition for seven years. Jen has been talking tech on Business News Network (formerly Report on Business Television) since 1999, and appears in the Technology in the Workplace segment on Workopolis.tv

She is @nejsnave on twitter.

Rohit is a founding member of the pioneering 360 Digital Influence Group at Ogilvy – a leading group in helping clients around the world navigate the social media universe. He publishes the award winning Influential Marketing blog (www.influentialmarketingblog.com) which listed as one of the top 50 marketing blogs in the world by AdAge magazine. Rohit is also the author of the newly released book, Personality Not Included: Why Companies Lose Their Authenticity and How Great Brands Get It Back, which is published by McGraw-Hill. A guide for companies on how personality and authenticity is the new standard that brands need live up to in the social media era – the book has received significant early praise, strong reviews, and features a forward by bestselling author and entrepreneur, Guy Kawasaki. Rohit is frequently featured in media worldwide including The Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, Fast Company, Marketing China (China) and AdWeek (Australia).

Andre Gaulin is the Sr. Director of Technology for the CTV Digital Media Group, where he guides the Design, Development, and Broadband Video practices that cross-pollinate with a number of Canada’s best known brands, including: MuchMusic, FashionTelevision, TSN, CTV.ca, and The Comedy Network. Over the last few years, the vast majority of his time has been dedicated to online video with a desire to bring Canadian offerings more in line with what’s available south of the border. Prior to his role at CTV, Andre delivered eCommerce solutions for one of North America’s largest B2B technology resellers, as well as spent a number of years in the trenches of the IT solutions world.

In the newly-created role of Director, Measurement, Alan works with clients from the business development phase all the way through their relationship with Hill & Knowlton, identifying the ideal metrics for defining, and then measuring success. Alan marries his background as a communications practitioner with a deep understanding and experience in measuring communications to deliver measurable impact. An active blogger and frequent speaker, Alan is also a resource on trends, theories and the latest insights in measurement.

Prior to joining Hill & Knowlton, Alan was the Vice-President, Business Development, at Cormex Research, a Canadian media content analysis and measurement firm. Before this, Alan held increasingly senior positions on both the client and supplier side including: CNW Group (formerly Canada Newswire) as Director, Media Intelligence Services; Bell Canada as Associate Director of Corporate Communication, and ING Canada as Marketing Communications Specialist.

Alan is a graduate of the University of Waterloo and holds a post-graduate certificate in public relations from Ryerson University and an M.A. in communication and culture from York University with research focusing on media effects and uses, audience analysis, reception studies and best practices in PR management and measurement. Alan teaches a course in research and program evaluation in Ryerson University’s post-graduate PR certificate program and is a member of the Canadian Public Relations Society’s Measurement Committee.

Katie Delahaye Paine is the founder and CEO of KDPaine & Partners LLC, a New Hampshire based research consultancy that provides measurement and accountability for corporations, non-profits and government agencies world wide. Her book, Measuring Public Relationships: the Data-Driven Communicator’s guide to Measuring Public Relationships was published inDecember 2007. Paine is the publisher of KDPaine’s Measurement Blog and The Measurement Standard, the first blog and the first newsletter for marketing and communications professionals dedicated entirely to measurement and accountability. Prior to launching KDPaine & Partners in 2002, Paine was the founder and president of The Delahaye Group, which she sold to Medialinkin 1999.

For the past two decades, Paine has been providing marketers and communications professionals the tools, data and information to help them make better business decisions. She and her firms have read and analyzed millions of news articles, blogs, newsgroup postings and internal communications and have conducted hundreds of thousands of interviews in the relentless pursuit of quantitative and qualitative measures of her client’s marketing success. She works with some of the world’s most admired companies including Raytheon, Facebook, and Southwest Airlines. Most recently, her endeavors have been focused on social mediameasurement as well as providing cost effective measurement programs for non-profits, small businesses and government agencies.

Paine was named the 2007 NH Woman Business Owner of the Year by the Small Business Administration. KDPaine & Partners’ measurement program for the American Society of Plastic Surgeons was recently awarded the PRNews 2007 Platinum Award for Research and Measurement. In 2006 she was named the Entrepreneurial Venture Creator Person of the Year by the University of New Hampshire and won the Business Excellence Award for Excellence in Media & Marketing from New Hampshire Business Review. A Cum Laude graduate of Connecticut College’s class of 1974, Katie majored in history and Asian studies. She received anHonorary Doctorate of Laws from New Hampshire College in May 1996. She is an Athena award winner and a Board member of the New Hampshire Political Library. Her life is featured in Mark Albion’s book, “Making a life, making a living.”

Katie was an initial founder and former chair of the Institute for Public Relations special commission on measurement and evaluation. She served as the US liaison to the European Standards Task Force to set international standards for media evaluation. She writes a regular column for PR News on corporate image and crisis communications and contributes to PRNews, Communications World, PR Week, Business Marketing and New Hampshire Magazine. Prior to founding The Delahaye Group, Paine was the director of corporate communications for Lotus Development Corporation, and previously was manager of merchandising for Hewlett-Packard Personal Computer Group. An accomplished speaker, Paine frequently lectures to conferences and universities including The American Strategic Management Institute, the Public Relations Society of America, theInternational Association of Business Communicators, and the Institute for International Research, the International Public Relations Research Conference, Ragan Communications Conferences, the PR Executive Forum, IPRA, the University of New Hampshire and Southern New Hampshire University.

Rachel Sklar is the Media & Special Projects Editor for the Huffington Post and is the editor of the site’s Eat The Press page. She has contributed to The New York Times, The New York Post, The Village Voice, Glamour, New York Magazine, The Financial Times and numerous publications in her northern homeland of Canada, and is a frequent guest on MSNBC’s Scarborough Country, as well as occasional turns on other programs and networks. She is currently working on Jew-ish, a humorous book about cultural identity, for HarperCollins and is the author of A Stroke of Luck: Life, Crisis and Rebirth of a Stroke Survivor (with Howard Rocket, Canada: 1998). She was previously the editor of FishbowlNY, a New York-based media industry blog, and currently posts random musings at her new blog, Tomatoes Are Delicious (because, really, they are). She was formerly a corporate lawyer in New York and Stockholm, where she never learned to like herring.

A Canadian New Media Award Winner, David has a proven record for developing technologies for the deployment and distribution of media on the Web. His company was the technical developer for the world famous BMW Films: The Hire series. Since 1999 he has worked and consulted for companies like Apple, Disney, Ford, Fox, PBS, and MTV.

In 2005 David founded Project Opus Technologies to develop social media technologies for the distribution and marketing of independent music. ProjectOpus.com was Canada’s first online social network for the licensing, distribution, and sale of indie music. The Opus Player was the industries first embedable music widget offering musicians the ability to sell their music directly from the Opus Player on any website. In the last 18 months Project Opus has been working with industry to build a new digital packaging format service for fans and artists. It is scheduled to launch summer 2008.

Daniel is the creative director at Digg, a co-founder of Pownce, and a co-founder of the Canadian web firm silverorange.

At silverorange, Daniel worked with a wide range of clients including Mozilla, Ning, Revision3, and Sloan. He’s since been lured to San Francisco after Kevin Rose dangled the prospect of In ‘N Out burgers and the opportunity to develop the user experience for the social news website Digg. As Digg’s creative director, Daniel has helped the site grow from a niche technology news site into one of the leading media services on the web with a massive and passionate community. Recently, along with Leah Culver and Kevin, Daniel helped found Pownce — a social network that lets you share files, events, messages, and links with your friends. Daniel works on feature development and the user interface of Pownce.

Nancy Baym has been writing and teaching about social uses and consequences of the internet for more than 15 years. She’s written many widely-cited articles about online community, fandom, and the intersections between on and offline social life , and also a book Tune In, Log On: Soaps, Fandom, and Online Community (Sage Press, Inc.). Her work has been translated into several languages. She is an Associate Professor in Communication Studies at the University of Kansas, where she is an award-winning teacher on topics including the use of new communication technologies in creating identities, relationships and communities, interpersonal communication, and qualitative research methods. She is a co-founder and Past-President of the Association of Internet Researchers, an international interdisciplinary association, and serves on the editorial boards of the premiere journals in the field.

George Tsiolis is a graduate of Osgoode Hall Law School and the Founder of AGORACOM, a second-generation financial community that has successfully eliminated epidemic levels of spam, bashing and profanity that plagued first-generation communities.

AGORACOM accomplished this by rejecting the traditional advertising model, which sacrifices quality for page views. Rather, it created an ASP model for public companies to create a community of shareholders, as well as, a wiki-powered “freemium” model for shareholders of non-clients.

The results have crushed the status quo model for financial discussion forums and significantly disrupting the models of advertising supported encumbents. AGORACOM is generating 7-digit annual revenues and profits from over 85 clients. Most importantly, both clients and members are extremely happy. Currently, approximately 140,000 unique visitors read 10,000,000 + pages of information every month.

George is proud to say he attended the inaugural Mesh Conference as a Web 2.0 newbie, applied valuable lessons learned to his business and returns to share his lessons with others.

Mike is the visionary behind Techdirt, building up the core idea into reality and recruiting the management team. In addition to providing the strategic direction for the company, Mike oversees all editorial aspects of the Techdirt’s public and customer sites. Mike’s insight into the realms of business and technology are the basis for his frequent posts to the award winning Techdirt blog. The widely followed, often quoted blog was launched in 1997. Prior to founding Techdirt Inc., Mike worked in business development and marketing at Release Software, an e-commerce startup, and in marketing at Intel. Mike has a bachelor’s degree in Industrial and Labor Relations and an MBA — both from Cornell University.

Michael is the co-founder and CEO of CommunityLend, a unique online social lending service launching across Canada in mid 2008. Prior to starting CommunityLend, Michael was part of the founding team and was Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Internet start up, epost, a world leader in the electronic bill presentment and payment industry. Michael’s team was responsible for building the epost customer network, which they grew to include every major Canadian financial institution, over 100 of Canada’s largest companies and over 3 million online users. Previous to this role, Michael was a Management Consultant in Washington, DC, a co-founder of an Internet start-up in Ottawa, and part of the launch team of a successful Labour Sponsored Investment Fund in Toronto. Michael also served as a Legislative and Special Assistant to a number of Members of Parliament at the House of Commons in Ottawa. Michael attended both the University of Manitoba and Carleton University and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Economics. Michael is a also a regular blog contributor at online professional marketing blog OneDegree.ca. Michael was born in Churchill, Manitoba and has lived in almost every region of Canada, from BC to Quebec, from Manitoba to the NWT. He currently resides in Toronto his wife and their two sons.

Mark Kingwell is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto and a contributing editor of Harper?s Magazine in New York. He is the author of eleven books of political and cultural theory, among them the national bestsellers Better Living (1998); The World We Want (2000); and, most recently, Concrete Reveries: Consciousness and the City (2008). His writing has appeared in diverse publications, including the Journal of Philosophy, Philosophical Forum, Philosophy and Social Criticism, the Harvard Design Magazine, the Yale Journal of Law and the Humanities, American Scholar, Harper?s, the New York Times, the Toronto Star, Adbusters, Queen?s Quarterly, and the Globe and Mail. Kingwell has lectured to academic and popular audiences in Canada, the U.S., Europe, and Australia. He is the recipient of the Spitz Prize for political theory, National Magazine Awards for both essays and columns, and an honorary doctorate from the Nova Scotia College of Art & Design for contributions to theory and criticism. His next book, a collection of essays on art and philosophy called Opening Gambits, will appear this fall.

Dina Kaplan is the co-founder and COO of blip.tv. Dina oversees business operations for the company, including media partnerships, distribution deals, PR, marketing, site and channel sponsorships and investor relations.

Blip.tv is the double Webby-award winning video sharing site focused on shows. It enables independent producers to create their own TV shows for the Internet, from scripted sitcoms and dramas to journalists covering the war in Baghdad. In writing about online video sites, Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal recently wrote, “My favorite is blip.tv.”

Before blip.tv, Dina was a television reporter with several local NBC affiliates. As a news reporter, Dina won an Emmy and numerous Society of Professional Journalists Awards and Associated Press Awards.

Before reporting, Dina produced stories for MTV News about politics, technology and a range of musical acts. She also helped coordinate MTV’s political Choose or Lose coverage.

After graduating from college, Dina worked at the White House as Director of Research for the White House Counsel’s Office and then as Special Assistant to the Director of Presidential Personnel. During college, Dina worked at Rock The Vote, setting up a volunteer network of representatives registering college students to vote.

Dina graduated from Wesleyan University with a degree in Economics, Government, Philosophy and History. She sits on the National Board of Wesleyan University and is a Founding Board Member of the Women’s Media Center and a member of the Producer’s Guild of America. Dina is a judge for the Webbies and the Interactive Media Awards and sits on the advisory board of the Socrates Society at the Aspen Institute. Dina also started the New York Founders Club, a gathering of Internet founders designed to promote entrepreneurship in New York City.

Dr. Michael Geist is a law professor at the University of Ottawa where he holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law. He has obtained a Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) degree from Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, Master of Laws (LL.M.) degrees from Cambridge University in the UK and Columbia Law School in New York, and a Doctorate in Law (J.S.D.) from Columbia Law School. Dr. Geist has written numerous academic articles and government reports on the Internet and law and was a member of Canada’s National Task Force on Spam.

He is an internationally syndicated columnist on technology law issues with his regular column appearing in the Toronto Star, Ottawa Citizen, Vancouver Sun, and the BBC. Dr. Geist is the editor of In the Public Interest: The Future of Canadian Copyright Law, published in 2005 by Irwin Law, the editor of several monthly technology law publications, and the author of a popular blog on Internet and intellectual property law issues.

Dr. Geist serves on the Privacy Commissioner of Canada’s Expert Advisory Board and on the Canadian Digital Information Strategy’s Review Panel. He has received numerous awards for his work including the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Pioneer Award in 2008, Canarie’s IWAY Public Leadership Award for his contribution to the development of the Internet in Canada and he was named one of Canada’s Top 40 Under 40 in 2003. More information can be obtained at www.michaelgeist.ca.

Derek Szeto is Founder, and President of Clear Sky Media Inc., the parent company of RedFlagDeals.com, Canada’s largest bargain-hunting community. Derek launched this innovative web site in November 2000 to address the lack of online shopping and promotional information available to Canadians. The site currently boasts over 1.3 million monthly unique visitors and over 23 million page views every month. According to Alexa.com, RedFlagDeals.com is one of the 100 most popular websites in Canada.

Leading a distinguished team operating out of Toronto and Montreal, Derek ensures RedFlagDeals.com is a vibrant web destination for Canadian consumers to find and share deals, coupons, promotions, and special offers for both online and offline shopping. For retailers and service providers, RedFlagDeals.com is an ideal channel to reach Canadian consumers who are ready and willing to whip out their wallets and spend.

Derek holds a Bachelor of Commerce from Queen’s University and was named CIBC Student Entrepreneur of the Year for Ontario in 2004 and an Ontario Finalist for the 2007 Ernst & Young Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Derek and RedFlagDeals.com have been featured in major broadcast media and print publications including City TV, CBC Newsworld, The Globe and Mail, Maclean’s Magazine, The National Post, and Chatelaine.

Lane Merrifield, Executive Vice President Walt Disney Internet Group, Co-founder and General Manager Club Penguin.

Lane Merrifield is general manager and one of three co-founders of Club Penguin, one of the most popular and fastest-growing virtual worlds for children. Since Club Penguin’s inception, Lane has led the management, operations and business strategy for Club Penguin out of the company’s headquarters in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada.

Lane helped develop and launch Club Penguin in 2005 and played an integral role in its phenomenal growth and success. The company’s commitment to creating a safe and ad-free online playground helped propel Club Penguin to international acclaim and a partnership with the Walt Disney Company, which acquired Club Penguin in August 2007.

Prior to his work with Club Penguin and the Walt Disney Internet Group, Lane held various technical and marketing roles with a range of companies in Canada and the United States, but his most memorable employment experience will always be his first job at Disneyland.

Lane has always nurtured a passion for using technology to connect people in new ways. He loves the fact that Club Penguin has the potential to bring kids from around the world together in a fun and creative environment.

Matt Mason began his career as a pirate radio and club DJ in London, going on to become founding Editor-in-Chief of the seminal magazine RWD. In 2004, he was selected as one of the faces of Gordon Brown’s Start Talking Ideas campaign, and was presented the Prince’s Trust London Business of the Year Award by HRH Prince Charles.He has written and produced TV series, comic strips, viral videos and records, and his journalism has appeared in The Observer Music Monthly, Adweek, VICE, Complex, Libération, and other publications in more than 12 countries around the world. He recently founded the non-profit media company Wedia with his wife Emily. He lives in New York City.Matt is the author of the recently published book “The Pirate’s Dilemma: How Youth Culture is Reinventing Capitalism“.

Ethan Kaplan is the head of all technology over at Warner Bros. Records. This works out well since the two things Ethan loves most in the world are music and technology. At WBR, Ethan’s responsible for all consumer facing web properties, technology initiatives, business development and research/development. Ethan comes from a background of conceptual art, film and technology. Prior to working at Warners, he received two Masters degrees in art from UC Santa Barbara, and pioneered the usage of the Internet in a large newspaper chain in the states. He also, at 16 years old, created the first R.E.M. website. He and Michael Stipe are now good friends. Accordingly, “Almost Famous” is his favorite movie

Media Accreditation Policy for mesh

Press information and interview requests are available by contacting Megan Hooper at megan.hooper@edelman.com or at 416.979.1120 x297.

Accreditation Requirements

All members of the media may apply to become accredited to attend mesh, but, due to space restrictions, we have limited accreditation to 10 spots.Applicants for media accreditation are asked to follow these guidelines:

1. Submit a brief (50-words max.) bio of your accomplishments as a member of the media including the topics covered and the name of the company, blog or other outlet that carries your stories or posts.
2. Include at least three samples or your work as attachments or links.
3. Indicate the size of your audience through supporting material such as the blog or organization’s readership, page views, etc.
4. Outline the topics, people or ideas you are interested in covering or learning about at mesh.
5. Provide a summary of how you plan to cover the event – liveblogging, on-site interviews, post-mesh posts or articles, etc.
6. Include full contact e-mail, phone number and address in case we need to contact you to clarify anything outlined above.
7. Send materials requested above to info[at]meshconference.com.

Key Dates

April 29, 2008: Accreditation opens for mesh
May 9, 2008: Deadline to submit request for media accreditation
May13, 2008: Deadline for mesh to confirm media accreditation and notify those that have not been accredited

Terms & Conditions

1. Media accreditation for mesh will be decided based upon the following criteria:
   • Fit of publication to core mesh topics and speakers
   • Quality of applicant’s personal output and that of his/her media outlet
   • Audience reach of media outlet(s)
   • Proposed coverage plans that generate maximum exposure for mesh topics
2. Accreditation will be determined at the discretion of mesh based on the above criteria. mesh reserves the right to limit accreditation to applicants who best demonstrate they meet the criteria listed above.
3. mesh reserves the right to allow limited, temporary access to members of the media during the event itself. This is designed to allow those who do not have full accreditation to interview speakers or attend seminars so they can cover the event.
4. If an applicant would like to guarantee access, all members of the media not accredited are welcome to purchase a ticket while they’re still available.



When is mesh being held?

Mesh is happening May 21st and 22nd, 2008 at the MaRS Collaboration Centre in downtown Toronto.


Where can I get information about mesh and who’s speaking?

Information about our keynote speakers can be found here although we have yet to publish information about the panels or workshops. To stay in the loop, subscribe to our RSS feed.

You can also follow by tracking us in the twitterverse - follow @meshcon and check out the action on hashtags (and to contribute, use “#mesh08″ in your twitters).

Want to know more about past meshes?  You can see pictures from past meshes on Flickr under the tags mesh06 and mesh07 and there are videos on Youtube for mesh06 and mesh07 as well, as well as our channel for any of our videos.  There are lots of videos on mdialog as well.  Our friend Loren Feldman shot some videos at mesh07 - they’re here.  And our friends at Storystream have the videos they’ve created for us online as well.


How much are tickets?

Tickets are $469 + GST. We are also offering 30 student tickets for $30 each + GST; post-secondary student ID must be shown at the door.


Should I register in advance?

Yes. We expect tickets to sell out fairly quickly.


Will there be exhibitors at mesh?

No.


Will there be WiFi at mesh?

Of course. As well, the main conference room has in-floor power, which means your laptop won’t go dead in the middle of a brilliant blog post.


Will there be any kind of social events happening?

Yes - details will be posted soon.


I’m flying in from Lithuania, where do I find out about Toronto?

There’s lots to do in Toronto. You can start at Toronto.com, or visit Ticketmaster, Now and Eye Magazine to find out what else is going on while you’re here, or just leave a comment on the blog and information will magically find its way to you. If you’re looking for a place to stay, Expedia has info on some great hotels close to downtown.


If I’m interested in becoming a mesh sponsor, who do I contact?

Our sponsorship/marketing wizard is Stuart MacDonald. You can contact him via e-mail.


Is there is way to make speaker proposals?

No. mesh isn’t your typical pitch-us-a-speaker type of event (sorry, PR folks). We look for people we would like to hear from - and think you would like to hear from - and then we invite them to participate.


Is there a way to stay informed about new mesh developments and events?

Sure. Subscribe to our RSS feed or get email updates via Feedblitz (sign up on the right) to stay up-to-date.


Should I bring my laptop or camera or audio recorder or camcorder?

Yes. We’ll have wireless at the conference, and lots of in-floor power, and you can record, photograph and film to your heart’s content. But it’s up to you to get the permission of anyone you you want to photograph, record or film. Unfortunately, everything that happens in Toronto does not stay in Toronto.


Why is mesh happening?

mesh is happening because five people with an enthusiasm for the Web and all the next-generation things happening around us decided an event like this one had to take place in Toronto. Events connecting Web ideas and leaders of the future are going on everyday around the world - Geneva has LIFT, Paris has Les Blogs, New York has BlogOn and Italy has, well, Italy has Venice, it doesn’t really need anything else - and now Toronto has mesh so we can be part of the Web 2.0 conversation.


Who’s behind mesh?

There are five of us:

• Mark Evans – Director of Community, PlanetEye Inc.
• Mathew Ingram - technology and business writer, Globe & Mail
• Mike McDerment - CEO, FreshBooks Online Invoicing
• Rob Hyndman - business lawyer, Hyndman | Law
• Stuart MacDonald - entrepreneur, marketer, founder Expedia.ca

We’re all house-trained - mostly - and passionate about what’s happening online in Canada.


Do you want a bite of my sandwich?

Sure - er, what is it?


Tuna salad.

OK, thanks.


Can I volunteer for mesh?

Yes, we’d love to have volunteers help us make mesh happen. If you’re interested, send an e-mail to us at info[at]meshconference.com.


I don’t care about conferences - tell me about the T-shirts.

Yes, there will be swag. More than last year, probably, but we’re still working out the details.


I’m a mesh panel moderator. Have any tips to help me make the panel tasty and delicious?

Jeremiah Owyang has a post on moderating conference panels that has loads of great tips. And keep in mind that guest participation is a big part of mesh - we suggest you ask for questions early and often. Good question karma is very mesh-y.


Where do I go if I need more information about mesh?

If we’ve missed something in the FAQ, contact us at info[at]meshconference.com.

When is it?

May 21st & 22nd, 2008

Where is it?

MaRS Centre, South Tower
101 College Street
Toronto, Ontario
Canada M5G 1L7

Why is it happening?

mesh is happening because five people with an enthusiasm for the Web and all the next-generation things happening around us decided an event like this one had to take place in Toronto. Events connecting Web ideas and leaders of the future are going on everyday around the world - Geneva has LIFT, Paris has Les Blogs, New York has BlogOn – and now Toronto has mesh so we can be part of the Web 2.0 conversation. Let’s connect, share and inspire… let’s mesh.

Who is running it?

• Mark Evans - director of community, PlanetEye Inc.
• Mathew Ingram - technology and business writer, Globe & Mail
• Mike McDerment - CEO, FreshBooks Online Invoicing
• Rob Hyndman - business lawyer, Hyndman | Law
• Stuart MacDonald - entrepreneur, marketer, founder Expedia

Mark Evans

After more than 10 years of writing about the Internet, I’ve caught the startup bug. Last July, I became director of community with PlanetEye Inc., an online travel guide that uses geotagged photographs, mapping technology and insight from locals to give people a real sense of where they want to go. I also write two blogs - Mark Evans and All About Nortel.

Mathew Ingram

I’m a journalist who writes about business and technology for The Globe and Mail, both for the “dead-tree” edition and the paper’s Web site at theglobeandmail.com. I’ve been working online for the Globe since the site was re-launched as a breaking news site in 2000, and been living and writing online since the early 1990s when a 9600-baud dial-up modem was the hot-rod of the Internet.I have a personal blog at mathewingram.com/work where I write about Web 2.0 ideas and companies, and a media blog at mathewingram.com/media, where I write about the intersection of the Web and the media business. I also do a business/technology blog for globeandmail.com called Geekwatch. I think that the kind of interactivity and dialogue that blogs and other Web 2.0 tools provide is already having — and will continue to have — a profound effect on the media industry and many other industries, and that’s why I wanted to be part of this conference.

Mike McDerment

I’m an entrepreneur, I guess. You can find my infrequent postings at michaelmcderment.com and on FreshThinking. I’m currently running FreshBooks, a rapidly growing online invoicing, time and expense tracking application. It’s a business that grew out of work we did for ourselves at a web design agency I used to run, and now over 300,000 people use FreshBooks for their own businesses. Organizing this conference was something I couldn’t pass up. It’s been a treat to work with these guys over the years and share our enthusiasm for the issues mesh addresses. Looking forward to seeing you all in May.

Rob Hyndman

I’m a Toronto technology business lawyer - my clients are technology companies and their customers. My firm is Hyndman | Law, a boutique law practice that provides legal counsel to technology businesses on a wide variety of business law needs. I’m an unabashed life-long geek who got his start more than 30 years ago as the vice-president of a two-member computer club in high school. I’m passionate about helping grow the Toronto Web 2.0 community and evangelizing the opportunities for connection, sharing and inspiration that the Web has given us. I blog at robhyndman.com, and have been described by Canadian Lawyer magazine as “one of Canada’s most prolific blawggers”. I wish that were cooler than it sounds.

Stuart MacDonald

I’m the CEO and Founder of Tripharbour Limited, operator of Tripharbor.com and Tripharbour.ca, two new, online cruise vacation ecommerce and community sites. We are making it easier for North Americans to find the perfect cruise holiday. As for me, I’m your basic online business geek. My fate was sealed way back when I sat in my apartment marveling at the glory that was eAAsy SABRE on 2400 baud dial-up. I remember watching as flight details, obtuse airport codes and impossible-to-understand pricing come up on my screen one character at a time. I felt like I had just landed on this big secret. I thought “This is going to be big.” Several years later, I brought Expedia to Canada and started Expedia.ca in my spare room. I ended up moving to Seattle as SVP/chief marketing officer for Expedia.com, as well as running the US packages business. Now back in Toronto, I’m a blogger, passionate about what Web 2.0 means for business and society, and very proud to be part of creating mesh.

Interested in speaking at mesh?

mesh isn’t your typical pitch-us-a-speaker type of event (sorry, PR folks). We look for people we would like to hear from — and think you would like to hear from — and then we ask them to participate.

For sponsorship opportunities please contact:

stuart [at] meshconference.com

For website inquiries contact:

mike [at] meshconference.com

Who Should Attend and Why

Marketing and public relations:

The Web is rewriting the rule book for the marketing industry. Word of mouth is still the most powerful fuel a company can buy, but now it comes in the form of blogs, podcasts, forums and instant messaging – and it can not only power your marketing engine, but burn you when you least expect it. Those on the front lines share their advice on what to do, and what not to do.

Media:

Traditional media of all kinds – newspapers, radio, television and magazines – are being transformed by the Web, whether they like it or not. For better or worse, the business is changing, and new forms of media are emerging that offer unprecedented levels of interactivity and customization. “Users” are generating their own content, and in some cases being paid for it. To find out how this transformation is taking place and what it means for you, come to mesh.

Investors and entrepreneurs:

One of the most powerful features of the new Web is that a great idea can become reality almost overnight, and great businesses can be built with a fraction of the investment capital required in most industries. How does that change the nature of the venture financing market and what does that mean for startups? What kinds of tools does the Web offer entrepreneurs who are building a business on a shoestring? Find out the answers to those questions and more from people who have done it.

Politicians and social activists:

The Web is a marketplace of ideas, and political ideas are a growing part of that mix. Most of the leading candidates for President of the United States launched their bids with video clips uploaded to YouTube, and they are making bloggers and new media outlets a key part of their campaigns. Social activists and other public-minded groups, meanwhile, are finding that the interactive Web is a perfect tool for getting their message out, and leveraging their communities into action. Learn how by coming to mesh.