Speakers

Andrea Reimer was elected to Vancouver City Council in 2008. She previously served as a Vancouver School Board Trustee (2002-2005), the first to be elected in Canada under the Green Party banner. As a School Trustee, Andrea played a leadership role in successful advocacy campaigns to restore provincial funding for public schools and worked to increase community access and expectations for the public school system. She was also one of the first elected officials in the country to maintain a blog while in public office, part of her commitment to accountability and transparency.

Jer Thorp is an artist and educator from Vancouver, Canada, currently living in New York. A former geneticist, his digital art practice explores the many-folded boundaries between science and art. Recently, his work has been featured by The New York Times, The Guardian, BusinessWeek and the CBC.Thorp’s award-winning software-based work has been exhibited in Europe, Asia, North America, South America, and Australia and all over the web.

Jer has over a decade of teaching experience, in Langara College’s Electronic Media Design Program, at the Vancouver Film school, and as an artist-in-residence at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design. Most recently, he has presented at Carnegie Mellon’s School of Art, at Eyebeam in New York City, and at IBM’s Center for Social Software in Cambridge.

In his previous life as a Flash developer and designer, Jer produced work for a broad base of clients including Honda, The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, FOX, and the LA Kings. blprnt.com, Jer’s unique collection of organic Flash experiments and generative artworks, has won numerous awards and has been featured in many art and design publications, both online and in print. Jer is a contributing editor for Wired UK.

He is currently Data Artist in Residence at the New York Times, and is a visiting Professor in New York University’s ITP program.

Jon Beasley-Murray works at the University of British Columbia in Canada, with principal interests in cultural and political theory and Latin American Studies. He writes a blog just about post-hegemony.

Alex Merrill the Systems/Operations Manager and Digital Initiatives Librarian at Washington State University. I support and coordinate the work of the desktop support group that resides within the Library Systems Unit. The Systems/Operations Group has the responsibility of supporting 400+ computers for both public and library personnel use. As Digital Initiatives Librarian I manage the WSU Libraries CONTENTdm installation and corresponding server software and hardware (including streaming media support). I also act as technical point person on an array of on-going digital projects and perform training and support duties as needed for the on-going digitization of library materials. I am local project coordinator for the Western Waters Digital Library (currently being supported by an NEH grant) and serve on the GWLA Digital Collections Committee. I am currently managing the digitization of the J. Elroy McCaw Memorial Film Collection supported by an award by the Apex Foundation. I am the technical lead for the local installation of Metalib (SearchIt!@WSU) and am backup for SFX (FindIt!@WSU). I am coordinating the efforts to move our web site into a Content Management System. I also serve on a number of committees and working groups both internal and external to the libraries.

Amy Buckland is the eScholarship, ePublishing & Digitization Coordinator at McGill University Library, where she is responsible for scholarly communication, publishing initiatives, and making rare items from special collections available to the world through digitization. She loves information almost as much as Fluevog shoes, and thinks academic libraryland is ripe for a revolution. You can find her online at informingthoughts.com and in most social networks as Jambina.

Ben Hyman is the Managing Director of the BC Libraries Cooperative. Under the auspices of the Cooperative, the Sitka consortia – powered by the Evergreen open ILS – thrives. Sitka was the second production instance of Evergreen in the world when it began in December 2007. By the end of 2011, over 75% of British Columbia’s public libraries will be Sitka members, as well as a handful of post-secondary, special and extra-jurisdictional libraries. Before joining the Cooperative, Ben worked for several years with the Provincial Government on files relating to library policy, legislation, technology and funding. He has held positions in public, post secondary and government libraries in Western Canada. His goats will eat Jed’s tennis racket any day.

Bess Sadler is a software engineering manager in the Stanford University Digital Library group. She’s one of the founders of the Blacklight open source software project (http://projectblacklight.org) and currently works on the Hydra digital repository project (http://projecthydra.org). She spends her time developing digital library software and trying to improve software and community development processes at Stanford and on several open source software efforts.

Brian Owen is Associate University Librarian at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada and Managing Director with the Public Knowledge Project. He is also an Associate with SFU’s Canadian Centre for Studies in Publishing and SFU’s Master of Publishing Program. In 2007, Brian received the Award for Distinguished Service to Research Librarianship from the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL).

Bronwen Sprout is the Digital Initiatives Coordinator at UBC Library. She coordinates (surprise!) the development and management of the Library’s locally created digital collections, including digital preservation activities. Bronwen is also the current President of the UBC Librarians and Archivists Association. Prior to joining UBC in 2005 as a digital initiatives librarian, Bronwen worked as a cybrarian at Suite101.com and as a consultant for small businesses and non-profits, assessing information needs and implementing a variety of web-based solutions.

Christopher Cormack has a BSc in Computer Science and a BA in Mathematics and Māori Studies. While working for Katipo Communications he was the lead developer of the original version of Koha, which went live at Horowhenua Library Trust on January 5, 2000. Since then he has served various roles in the community: release manager, QA manager and Translation manager. He is the elected release manager for 3.6.
Christopher currently works for Catalyst IT in Wellington. Christopher believes in Free Software and allowing users the freedom to innovate.

Declan Fleming is the director of IT at the University of California, San Diego Libraries.  His main interests revolve around using tech to help people, building communities, linked data, and building sustainable repositories.

Geoff Harder is Digital Initiatives Coordinator for the University of Alberta Libraries. Geoff works with a wide variety of UAL teams doing very interesting work in the areas of digitization, repository services, digital scholarship, data curation and digital preservation. He has served on a number of regional, national and international  groups and project teams.

Grace Dunbar is Vice President of Equinox Software, Inc., a company of talented (and quirky) individuals who are dedicated to supporting open source initiatives in libraries. Grace came to Equinox from Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune where she was the Library Director for their three base libraries. Prior to that, Grace cut her proverbial library teeth deep in the bowels of the Stanford University Libraries where she oversaw the Google Books scanning project. If you track her down during happy hour, Grace would love to talk about open source in libraries… or share pictures of pets and kids.

Heather Piwowar is a postdoctoral research associate with DataONE and the Dryad data repository at NESCent. Heather studies the patterns with which scientists share and reuse research datasets to inform efficient and effective use of data resources. She has measured the citation benefit of publicly sharing research data, studied patterns in public deposition of datasets, and is currently investigating patterns of data reuse and the impact of journal data sharing policies. Heather has a bachelor’s and master’s degree from MIT in electrical engineering, 10 years of experience as a software engineer, and a PhD in Biomedical Informatics from the University of Pittsburgh. She lives in Vancouver, Canada.

James Fournie is a librarian/developer who has worked on the Sitka project for nearly 4 years. James is originally from Ontario but lived in Montreal and New York before settling in Vancouver.

Jed Moffitt has been the Director of Information Technology Services for the King County Library System (KCLS) since 1999. KCLS is a large and centrally coordinated collection of 47 libraries in the greater Puget Sound area of western Washington. With an annual circulation of over 22 million items, KCLS is always among the busiest library systems in America. KCLS is recognized nationally for library technology innovation. Noteworthy initiatives during Jed’s tenure include the development of a first-of-its-kind central sorting system for automating the distribution of library materials and the overnight fulfillment of the 6 million holds annually placed by system patrons. More recently, KCLS has been a leader in the substantial development build-out of the Evergreen open-source library system and community. This leadership includes co-authorship of an IMLS grant focused on making it easy for public libraries to adopt an Integrated Library System that is both highly functional, and available freely and without licensing fees to all public libraries interested in taking charge of their automated future. Prior to KCLS Jed spent 10 years in the Library Automation industry in a variety of technical and management capacities as one of the first employees of Dynix Inc. back in the old days when grass grew wild and green and rivers ran free. He will beat you at tennis or play jazz piano for you anytime at your request.

John Richardson is Director, Library Partnerships, for Polaris Library Systems.

Julie Mitchell is the Interim Coordinator for the Chapman Learning Commons in the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre at the University of British Columbia. She has a master’s degree in library and information studies from the University of British Columbia. In her current role, Julie works collaboratively with the campus community to develop and deliver learning support and academic enhancement opportunities for students. Passionate about teaching, learning, and innovative applications of new technology in the library environment, Julie is invested in empowering students to become successful lifelong learners.

Kevin Stranack is the the Coordinator of Community Services and Learning (Open Source Projects) at Simon Fraser University Library, working extensively with editors, researchers, librarians, publishers, and software developers in the pursuit of alternative methods of scholarly publishing and library automation. He is also a graduate student in adult education, with an interest in online community building, open education, and knowledge management.

Kimberly Christen is an Associate Professor in the Department of Critical Culture, Gender and Race Studies and the Director of Digital Projects at the Plateau Center for American Indian Studies at Washington State University. Her research focuses on contemporary indigenous alliance-making globally. Her book, Aboriginal Business: Alliances in a Remote Australian Town explores the complexities of Aboriginal modernities as they relate to a range of “business” ventures—including technological collaborations. She has worked with the Warumungu community in Central Australia on a range of projects over the last ten years including an educational website and a community digital archive. She is currently working with the Umatilla, Coeur d’Alene, Spokane, Colville, and Yakama tribes and the Washington State University libraries designing the Plateau Peoples’ Web Portal. Her current academic research grows from this work and focuses on the intersection of digital technologies, intellectual property rights, archival process and cultural heritage movements within indigenous communities and the global commons. In 2010-2011 Dr. Christen will be collaborating with the Center for Digital Archaeology at UC Berkeley on an NEH-funded grant to develop the beta version of Mukurtu a free, open source digital archive and content management tool specifically designed to meet the needs of indigenous communities as they manage and share their digital cultural heritage. More of Dr. Christen’s work, including publications and projects, can be found at her website: www.kimchristen.com and you can follow her on twitter @Mukurtu.

Mark Jordan is Head of Library Systems at SFU. His interests include repository platforms, content management frameworks, and digital preservation. Mark is also the author of Putting Content Online: A Practical Guide for Libraries (Chandos, 2006).

Mark Leggott is the University Librarian at UPEI, architect and lead on the Islandora project, and President and CEO of DiscoveryGarden, an open source SaaS company. Mark is also the Founding Director of Knowledge for All and is passionate about things open: open access, open data and open source. He created Knowledge for All and Islandora as an effort to return publicly produced scholarship to the public domain where it can benefit all of society.

Marty Tarle is the VP Engineering of the BiblioCommons social discovery layer for libraries, serving as Chief Architect and managing the day-to-day operations of the Engineering team. Prior to joining BiblioCommons Marty was Director of Development at Tira Wireless, an early leader in the mobile technology sector.

Matt Carlson is the Evergreen Administrator for the King County Library System, managing both the library’s ongoing Evergreen development project and the production instance of Evergreen. Leading up to the launch of Evergreen at KCLS in September of 2010 he was Project Manager of the development and implementation of the system. He has worked for KCLS for over 10 years, serving in Circulation and Reference services prior to joining the Information Technology department. He is excited about the potential he sees in open source systems for libraries and what comes next.

MJ Suhonos is a graduate of the University of Toronto’s Master of Information Studies program (2007) and has over 10 years experience developing high-performance websites. He has worked with a number of information organizations and initiatives, including the Public Knowledge Project, Synergies Canada, the Centre for Global eHealth Innovation, and Toronto Public Library. He has also served on the editorial team of several scholarly journals, including Code4Lib Journal, Open Medicine, and the Journal of Medical Internet Research. MJ has written a variety of articles and delivered a number of presentations and workshops on the topics of structured metadata management, open access publishing, and open source development practices.

Nick Ruest is the Digital Preservation Librarian, Repository Architect and Digitization Coordinator at McMaster University. He oversees the technical aspects of the library’s digital initiatives, develops policies and workflows for digital preservation, digitization and metadata delivery, writes really bad code, and manages a number of servers. He is also the Vice-President/President elect of the Ontario Library and Technology Association as well as the President of the McMaster University Academic Librarians Association and a CAUT Defence Fund trustee. In his spare time, albeit very spare, he thinks about writing music again, and reads way too many graphic novels.

Nina Saklikar is the Web Librarian at Simon Fraser University Library. Nina is responsible for the overall support and planning for SFU Library’s website that uses Drupal, an open-source content management system, in conjunction with a variety of other open source and proprietary software tools.

Paul Joseph is the Systems Librarians for applications and interfaces at UBC Library. He manages a variety of software and web development projects, including the EZproxy Wondertool (http://code.google.com/p/wondertool) and the Mondo Grinder License Database (http://code.google.com/p/mondo-license-grinder), and oversees the maintenance of several library systems with a small team of hard working programmers. Paul has also been the Systems and Technical Services Librarian at the Emily Carr University Library, an Information Architect at the BBC, and has had other librarian positions at the CBC, Natural Resources Canada and the Vancouver Public Library. Prior to his professional career as a librarian, he was a forest engineer designing logging roads in valleys along the rugged coast of British Columbia.

Peter Van Garderen is President of Artefactual Systems (http://artefactual.com), a Vancouver-based company specializing in technology consulting and open-source software for archives and libraries. Peter is the project lead for the ICA-AtoM archival description software project (http://ica-atom.org), Archivematica digital preservation software project (http://archivematica.org), and Digital Collection Builder software project (http://dcb-gcn.canadiana.ca/). Peter is a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of British Columbia’s Master of Archival Studies (1997) program and a Doctoral Candidate in Archival Science at the University of Amsterdam (20??).

Scott Hargrove is the Director of Information Technology and Support Services at Fraser Valley Regional Library.  He is also a Board member of the British Columbia Libraries Cooperative, and chairs the Licensing Business Function Group for that organization.

Slavko Manojlovich is the Associate University Librarian (IT) at Memorial University of Newfoundland where, for the past 25 years, he has been responsible for managing the impact of technological change on library services from punch cards, to SPIRES IBM mainframe ILS, to CD-ROM OPAC, to SirsiDynix, to WorldCat Local, to …. For the past six years he has been responsible for developing and managing the award winning Digital Archives Initiative (DAI) which is preserving the rich historical, cultural and scholarly resources of Newfoundland and Labrador. Slavko spent 2010 on sabbatical leave in the UK doing research on digital preservation best practices which will insure the long-term access to and usability of the DAI.

Steven Chan is an early member of the Sitka project team, having helped migrate the first twelve public libraries to Evergreen. He has been involved with several nonprofit activities, for example, helping to found the Vancouver Community Network, a member of a national advisory committee to provide computers for groups in the voluntary sector, a participant in the Canadian Research Alliance for Community Innovation and Networking. He worked as a software engineer for several local high technology companies providing mobile data infrastructures. He has a degree in Electrical Engineering from UBC.

Tara Robertson is the Systems + Technical Services Librarian at Emily Carr University of Art + Design. She is interested in community development, open source software and various aspects of design. Prior to Emily Carr she has worked at several activist and feminist libraries, Vancouver Public Library, Great Northern Way Campus, the Sitka Evergreen support team and the National Library of New Zealand.

Will Engle is a MLIS student at UBC’s School of Library, Archival and Information Studies. He works for the Centre for Teaching, Learning and Technology at UBC, where he is focused on creating organizational and structural support for the UBC Wiki. Previously, Will was the executive director of the Association of Telehealth Service Providers, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the distribution of health care resources through telecommunication technologies.

William Wueppelmann has worked with Canadiana for the past ten years developing its digitization and online access capabilities, and developing metadata standards, practices and tools. He is currently the information systems manager and works with a small team on developing Canadiana’s next generation of online services and digital content. He obtained his MLIS from McGill university in 1997 and learned a variety of systems and programming skills through hobbies and on the job experience.