Board of Advisors Biographies
2009-2010 Board of Advisors
Michael Angeles
Brooklyn, NY, USA
Michael is the Director of User Experience at Traction Software, Inc. He is a founder of the IA Institute and was instrumental in developing our original website and technical operations. If you remember IAslash, that was Michael.
For more about Michael, please visit konigi.com or follow him on Twitter @konigi.
Jorge Arango
Panama City, Panama
Jorge is an information architect and web designer from Central America. In 1995 he founded BootStudio, one of the first web consultancies in his part of the world. He’s led web development teams in his home country of Panama, as well as the US and the UK. Jorge is also the managing editor of Boxes and Arrows, an online journal devoted to the practice, innovation and discussion of design and has served one term on the Information Architecture Institute Board of Directors, including one year as President.
For more about Jorge, please visit www.jarango.com.
Lane Becker
San Francisco, CA, USA
Lane Becker is co-founder and President of Get Satisfaction, a web startup dedicated to fostering new methods of communication and collaboration between companies and their customers.
Previously, Lane was co-founder of Adaptive Path, a user experience strategy, research, and design consultancy, known for, among other things, coining the technology terms "blog" and "ajax." While with Adaptive Path, Lane ran the consulting business and, as the creator of the New Ventures program, developed strategic partnerships with early-stage startup companies to provide them with long-term support for their product ideation, design, and launch strategies. The New Ventures program has seen successful exits with two of its portfolio companies so far, Sphere and Plazes.
For more about Lane, please visit http://www.linkedin.com/in/lanebecker.
Sean Belka
Boston, MA, USA
Sean is the SVP of Fidelity’s Center for Applied Technology (FCAT), which was established in 1999 to serve as a bridge, linking Fidelity’s technology resources with executives who are seeking innovative approaches to tactical and strategic business challenges. Sean was the visionary behind the redesign of the Fidelity.com home page and shift in strategic direction to bringing objective market news/commentary to the Fidelity.com experience.
For more about Sean, please visit http://www.linkedin.com/pub/sean-belka/0/510/58a.
Peter Bogaards
Bussum, Netherlands
Peter is community builder at InforMaat and owner of BogieLand. He is currently one of the reference figures in the Netherlands, which is one of the largest / most mature IA / UX markets in Europe. He’s been involved with a lot of community-driven efforts (including UXmatters and the EuroIA/UX network initiative) and he’s also the guy behind informationdesign.org, a long standing, widely known and well respected shoutboard on IA and UX.
For more about Peter, please visit http://www.bogieland.com/profile.htm or follow him on Twitter @bogiezero.
Paul Ford
Brooklyn, NY, USA
Paul Ford is an editor at Harper's Magazine, where he edits, designs, and programs the Harper's website and occasionally edits for the print magazine. In 2007 he launched a new version of Harpers.org featuring every issue of the magazine published since 1850--a quarter-million pages scanned, searchable, and published to the web using a custom, Semantic Web-based content management system. His weblog Ftrain.com goes back to 1997.
For more on Paul, visit http://ftrain.org.
Dave Gray
Portland, OR, USA
Dave Gray is the Founder and Chairman of XPLANE, the visual thinking company. Founded in 1993, XPLANE has grown to be the world’s leading consulting and design firm focused on information-driven communications. Dave’s time is spent researching and writing on visual business, as well as speaking, coaching and delivering workshops to educators, corporate clients and the public. He is also a founding member of VizThink, an international community of Visual Thinkers.
For more on Dave, visit http://davegrayinfo.com.
Jan Jursa
Berlin, Germany
Jan is an Information Architect at T-Systems Multimedia Solutions in Berlin. He is the co-organizer of the German IA Conference (IA Konferenz), editor of IA Television, and frequent host of the Berlin IA Cocktail hour. He is a long-standing country ambassador of the European IA Conference (EuroIA). Jan has also been an active volunteer with IA Institute's translations and web operations teams.
For more on Jan, visit his blog (The Hot Strudel) or follow him on Twitter: @IATV.
Jonathan Knoll
Brooklyn, NY, USA
Jonathan is an independent user experience design & development consultant based in Brooklyn, NY. In this role, he has sought to improve research methodology by using available technologies to work more efficiently in the study of comparative electoral systems, voter strategy, and other related sub-fields. Jonathan, or Yoni as we call him, was a key volunteer in the IDEA 2009 planning. He developed the 2009 IDEA Conference website, and has helped the IAI manage some messy back office functionality with our membership system. He is currently leading efforts with board member Livia Labate in our upcoming system infrastructure development and platform migration.
For more on Yoni, visit http://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanknoll.
Michael Leis
Philadelphia, PA, USA
Michael is a strategic consultant helping brands and agencies solve problems through converged media. He has two decades of experience integrating narrative forms and technologies to deliver significant improvements in value proposition, corporate knowledge, and revenue. He recently won one of the Web Marketing Association WebAwards for Emmi Foods and Aircell’s Gogo (Commercial Airline Wi-Fi) launch sites. He was a key volunteer for the 2009 IDEA Conference.
For more on Michael, visit http://blog.michaelleis.com/.
Peter Merholz
San Francisco, CA, USA
Peter Merholz is a founding partner, board member, and president of Adaptive Path. For more than seven years, Peter has been instrumental in developing Adaptive Path's ability to provide world-class consulting, training, and public events. He served as President of the IA Institute during the 2005-2006 term.
For more on Peter, visit http://peterme.com.
Kiki Mills
Boston, MA, USA
Kiki has experience as both an Executive Director and now President of (one of the) country’s leading non-profit associations for the Internet business and marketing industry (MITX). Kiki developed a strategic agenda to drive the growth of New England`s digital industry, highlighting three core initiatives: Industry Advancement, Talent Retention, and Community Building.
For more on Kiki, visit http://www.mitx.org/blog/.
Peter Morville
Ann Arbor, MI, USA
Peter is a founder of the Information Architecture Institute and coauthor with Louis Rosenfeld of O'Reilly's "Information Architecture for the World Wide Web," affectionately known as The Polar Bear Book in IA circles. He is best known for helping to create the discipline of information architecture, and he serves as a passionate advocate for the critical roles that search and findability play in defining the user experience. He is the author of "Ambient Findability," also by O'Reilly and is working on a new book with Jeffery Callender called, "Search Patterns."
For more on Peter, visit http://semanticstudios.com.
Leisa Reichelt
London, United Kingdom
Leisa is a Freelance consultant, specializing in design research & user centred design (IA, IxD etc.). She is particularly interested in the strategic aspects of these disciplines. A recent high profile project that she has been working on recently for the Drupal community can be viewed at d7ux.org.
For more on Leisa, visit http://disambiguity.com.
Stacy Surla
Poolesville, VA, USA
Stacy is focused on strengthening the organizational infrastructure of the IA Institute so it can support bold initiatives, like the development of Local Groups across the world. She is a co-founder of the DCIA local group in Washington, DC, edits the IA Column in the ASIS&T Bulletin, served as chair for the 2005 Information Architecture Summit, co-founded the Rosebud independent film and video festival, managed fundraising for the DC Arts Center, co-chaired the Foundation for Mid-East Communication, served as briefing leader for the Hunger Project, started a crimewatchers program in Haight-Asbury, and organized a neighborhood circus. She has made numerous public speaking, TV, and radio appearances on topics ranging from arts programming to Y2K readiness.
Stacy is an Information Architect for the MITRE Corporation.
Christina Wodtke
San Francisco, CA, USA
Christina is a Founder of the Information Architecture Institute. She has been bringing products to market on the web for 12 years now, in a variety of roles from design to entrepreneur to product manager. Her specialty is taking a product from Concept to Reality. At LinkedIn, she leads the team that took LinkedIn Events from idea to launch. Before that she founded Cucina Media and created a (perhaps too) innovative CMS; founded the IA Institute, as well as Boxes and Arrows, an independent publication on design. As a partner at MIG, she helped clients like The New York Times reinvent search and Rodale concept new Digital products, and at Yahoo she lead the design teams who reinvented Yahoo Seach, Shopping and Local.
For more on Christina, visit http://eleganthack.com.
This page was last modified on December 2, 2009 09:08 PM.