Organizers

Matt is the co-founder and CTO of Alley Interactive, where he works on large media and publishing sites, focusing on data visualizations and advanced front-end experiences. He has overseen projects for clients including The Brookings Institution, The Guggenheim Museum, Foreign Policy magazine, and The New Republic. He lives in Brooklyn, New York, and is @xmatt on Twitter.

Steph lives in Boston, MA and is super passionate about all things journalism and technology. She currently works at WordPress.com VIP, and previously worked on the editorial teams at America’s Test Kitchen, Chicago Tribune, and The Boston Globe. She is the lead organizer for BigWP, a meetup focused on WordPress publishing at scale. You can find her on Twitter @crushgear.

Adam Schweigert is a Senior Web Developer at Mother Jones based in Columbus, Ohio. He previously built and led the Product and Technology Team at the Institute for Nonprofit News where he led development of the Largo, a WordPress framework for news and publishing sites. Before that he worked as a consultant, and founded and led digital departments at NPR/PBS member stations in Bloomington, Indiana, and Columbus, Ohio. You can read his bad jokes on Twitter at @aschweig.

Taylor is a WordPress aficionado with an eclectic background in sales, marketing and project management. As an experienced agency project manager, Taylor has managed many interactive projects and initiatives for leading clients, including WordPress publishers such as TechTarget and MIT Knight Science Journalism’s, Undark Magazine. Follow Taylor on Instagram and everywhere else online – @tayhansenxo. 

Alexis is currently learning to wrangle all things WordPress while working with the WordPress.com VIP team at Automattic. She lives in New York, NY and can be found quarterly at BigWP NYC. This serial retweeter can also be seen on Twitter @alexiskulash.

Brad drives process, delivery and strategy for Alley and its clients while also managing large-scale news media projects. Brad led the New York Post’s monumental rebuild of its website in 2013 and subsequent redesign in 2015, executing two of the largest launches in the history of WordPress. He also lead the relaunch of POLITICO Europe after POLITICO’s acquisition of Alley client European Voice. Most recently, Brad led the relaunch of TwinCities.com for Digital First Media.

Christie has worked for multiple digital media publications including Willamette Week, amNewYork, and the Observer. She now helps cool people and organizations promote their projects on WordPress sites at Automattic. She tweets every once in awhile at @christiejwright.

Aaron Jorbin is a polyhistoric man of the web that knows rabble rousers get shit done.  Currently Director of Engineering for Some Spider, a NYC-based digital media & entertainment company and a WordPress Core Committer, Aaron focuses on improving developer happiness and making the internet usable and enjoyable by everyone. His free time pursuits tend to be focused on art, beverages, and international politics. He tweets at @aaronjorbin and writes regularly at daily.jorb.in.

Ben is a news apps developer at the Institute for Nonprofit News, where his responsibilities include supporting The Largo Project and helping member organizations with their projects.

Ryan is a WordPress Developer for Digital First Media from Denver, Colorado where he works on websites for newspapers such as the Denver Post, and Mercury News. He has been working with WordPress for the past 8 years, building websites and products for customers around the world. He is also one of the organizers for the WordPress Denver Meetup. You can find him most places on the internet as @CodeProKid

Davis Shaver is a Senior Software Developer at Alley Interactive who specializes in analytics, optimization, and newsroom experience. Prior to Alley, Davis worked at Philadelphia Media Network, where he helped launch the company’s first dedicated analytics team. In addition, Davis serves as a co-organizer of Hacks/Hackers Philly and runs a design thinking program for Young Involved Philadelphia.

Chris Hardie is an Internet technology professional living in Richmond, Indiana. Having previously started and managed a boutique web development firm for 17 years, he now works on client projects at Automattic. Chris tweets at @ChrisHardie and writes about tech, culture, marketing and community-building at ChrisHardie.com.