Adam Silverstein
Adam started programming by learning assembly code on his Radio Shack color computer (with 4k!). After years building completely custom solutions he embraced WordPress as his platform of choice, building themes and plugins for clients large and small.
Adam contributed extensively to the revisions rewrite in WordPress 3.6 and has contributed to every release since. Adam now works as a Senior Web Engineer at 10up. When not coding he loves rafting , mbira, travel, walks and tending his garden.
Ben Gathard
A St. Louis native, Ben is a web designer and front-end developer and has been developing for WordPress since 2010. He co-founded Brevity in 2013, which specializes in branding, web design and developing custom, responsive WordPress themes for their clients. Ben is a big advocate for css frameworks, modular development and of course WordPress. Outside of client work Ben has a number of personal projects, including Lazer Vs The Machines, an online tutorial-based website due to launch in Sping 2014. Sometimes he tweets about stuff @bengathard.
Brian Messenlehner
Brian is the co-founder of WebDevStudios.com, a web development company that specializes in building all things WordPress. He is also the co-founder of AppPresser.com, a WordPress based framework for building iOS and Android Apps.
Brian started his career as a software developer for the U.S. Marines with a focus on building web applications and relational databases for the Marine Corps Logistics Command. After the Marines, and prior to WebDevStudios he worked at a law firm in New Jersey building custom web applications to identify and track insurance and healthcare fraud for clients such as Allstate and Encompass.
Brian loves WordPress in his spare time! He is the co-author of the book “Building Web Apps with WordPress” by O’Reilly Media, which is about leveraging WordPress as an Application Framework and he is the organizer of the New Jersey WordPress Meetup Group.
Brian enjoys learning about new technology and believes open source software like WordPress is the key to successful cost effective web solutions in any situation.
Follow Brian on Twitter at: @bmess, @webdevstudios, @apppresser, and @bwawwp
Carrie Dils
Carrie Dils is a WordPress Developer specializing in the Genesis Framework. Based out of Fort Worth, Texas, she splits her time between serving clients and creating custom WordPress themes. Outside of WordPress, she loves dogs, books, candy, running, Jesus, and her husband, Dave. She tweets somewhat excessively at @cdils.
Chip Bennett
Chip has been using WordPress since 2005, and has been a hobbyist web developer since the mid-90s. He has developed WordPress Themes and Plugins, and is a minor contributor to WordPress core. He is an admin for the WordPress Theme Review Team that reviews/approves Themes for inclusion in the WordPress Theme Repository. He can often be found in the WordPress.org support forums and at WordPress StackExchange. He is also a part-time freelance WordPress developer.
Chris Koerner
By day Chris works in the Data Management department at Mercy where he helps empower co-workers with collaborative technologies. A long-time WordPress fan he enjoys helping local non-profits and small businesses develop strong web presences using WordPress.
Chris loves debunking the status quo and is always asking annoying questions.
You can find him on Twitter @ckoerner
Chris Miller
Chris is the founder of Spiked Studio, a niche podcast network offering video and audio shows on social media, IBM software, BlackBerry and product reviews. He speaks globally at conferences, user groups and industry events. Chris is in the process of completing his second book titled Social Identity due out at the end of 2012. You can find Chris as @IdoNotes on every network, yes everything
Christoph Trappe
A newspaper reporter by trade, Christoph left the newspaper industry in 2007 to research, write and produce training videos for the U.S. financial services industry. He then started a community news site and currently works as a communications executive in the nonprofit sector.
His career has focused on helping organizations tell their stories in authentic and meaningful ways. He uses and teaches brand and traditional journalism as well as content marketing techniques in the pursuit of great stories.
He’s currently helping United Way of East Central Iowa tell its stories in an authentic way through a multi-channel content delivery strategy that engages all of United Way’s key audiences.
He lives in Marion, Iowa, with his wife and their daughter.
Doug Stewart
Doug is a 15-year-veteran of the IT industry, a long-time Linux user and has been using WordPress since version 1.0. He had to be dragged, kicking and screaming into using a Mac in 2006 or so and might even admit that it’s probably for the best if you catch him on the right day. He has a passion for systems and for getting the most out of WordPress and has applied his skills in the commercial, government contracting, healthcare and general IT spheres.
Doug is currently a Senior Systems Engineer for 10up and can be found co-organizing the monthly Philadelphia WordPress Meetup and WordCamp Philadelphia when he’s not working diligently behind the scenes. You can find him on Twitter @zamoose
Eric Juden
Eric is a Senior Application Developer at EPC, Inc. in St. Charles, Missouri. His role there is to create and support applications using C#, ASP.NET and PHP. At his previous job as the web application developer, Eric migrated the Maryville University website to use WordPress Multisite as their CMS and blogging platform. He’s written several WordPress plugins (available on the wordpress.org plugin repository) and custom themes. Eric has been working with WordPress since 2008. He also helps lead the St. Louis WordPress Developers meetup.
James Hipkin
James is an accomplished, forward-thinking marketing professional with 25+ years of multi-disciplinary experience in marketing and marketing communications companies serving high-profile, global brands and B2C clients in packaged goods, durables, transportation, telecommunications and financial services. He has been involved in digital for the past ten years, first as President of a direct marketing agency in San Francisco, where he led the evolution of the agency from traditional direct marketing to digital. Clients included Apple and Wells Fargo online bank. And then as the head of a mid sized agency’s interactive group, with Toyota as the main client. He joined Red8, a long term vendor, as an owner and managing director 3.5 years ago.
Jared Novack
Jared is a founder and partner at Upstatement, a design firm located in Boston that specializes in responsive websites for media companies (like BostonGlobe.com which they designed in 2011). At Upstatement he directs projects and uses WordPress to build and prototype sites. Jared was formally the newsroom developer at the Houston Chronicle and Boston Globe and an adjunct professor at MassArt. He graduated from Syracuse University in 2006 with a BA in Computer Art and from Ladue Horton Watkins High School in 2002.
Joe McGill
Joe McGill is from St. Louis, MO, where he works as a web designer at Washington University. He specializes in creating future-friendly user experiences that work well on multiple devices and loves swapping ideas on twitter or over one of his nine daily cups of coffee.
Joshua Ray
Joshua Ray is a passionate web developer and lover of Golf, Coffee and Micro Brews. He got his start at Yahoo! in Portland Oregon as a web hosting support technician. Through support he taught himself front end development and found WordPress. Since his time at Yahoo! he has worked locally and telecommute for digital agencies to raise the bar for what’s possible with WordPress.
Currently he is with Singularity Interactive, a game development start up in Boulder, Colorado working to build engaging online experiences through web applications and games.
Konstantin Obenland
Konstantin is a WordPress developer and core contributor since WordPress 3.4. After contributing to Twenty Twelve, he was the backup lead and theme developer for Twenty Thirteen and Twenty Fourteen, the most recent default themes. Today he’s working on improving the theme selection experience on WordPress.com. He enjoys craft beers and good food — sometimes so much that blogs about it.
Leigh M Caldwell
Leigh M. Caldwell is Director of Social Media and Digital Marketing at Harness TechED. She is a content creator and marketing strategist with two decades of experience in social, online, print and broadcast media. Leigh is a native of West Frankfort, Illinois, and a Southern Illinois University alum. She’s also been blogging with WordPress since 2008 at ThemeParkMom.com.
Mary Baum
A 30-year veteran creative, Mary is a degreed designer with a track record in every marketing discipline and most media, from traditional print ads to corporate communications and long-form direct response copy.
Now her first love is the web – where every customer relationship begins, and the paint never dries. After a number of years building sites the wrong way, she finally learned proper HTML and CSS at the tender age of 47 and started with WordPress (and php) at 50.
A certified typography nut, Mary is a competitive tennis player who would like nothing better than to make a specialty out of doing tennis-themed sites. She and her husband, Dick Moomaw, are spending a couple of years in California; they have two grown children who are both gainfully employed.
Michael Arestad
Michael is a designer at Automattic, the makers of WordPress.com. He may be a tad obsessed with CSS (especially Sass) and beautiful typography. He contributes to WordPress Core, VaultPress, Jetpack, and WordPress.com. You can follow him on twitter @michaelarestad
Mike Hansen
Mike is a WordPress Developer working on the Open Source Outreach team at Bluehost. He spends his day contributing back to the WordPress project, writing patches , and brainstorming with others on features and best practices. He loves giving back to causes that makes the world a better place. You can find him on Twitter @MikeHansenMe
Myke Bates
Myke is a web developer, musician, husband, and pizza connoisseur. While not one to boast of verbose skill sets and fancy job titles, Myke is known for crafting one-of-a-kind WordPress themes and solutions. Born and raised in the Midwest, his friendly approach sets him apart from the others. By day, you will find him combining technology and creative ideas together with his friends at The Alchemedia Project. By night, he is most always burning the midnight oil on a handful of freelance projects and other personal ventures. You can find him on Twitter @MykeBates
Nile Flores
Nile is a sassy Southern Illinois mom who is a WordPress Designer and Developer, and a Professional Blogger. She’s passionate about helping others rock out their websites through her own site, Blondish.net. Nile has mentored thousands of bloggers over the past 13 years while teaching WordPress, blogging, SEO, social media, and web design. While Nile may be a WordPress designer and developer, she is also a WordPress fan, having used the CMS since its beginning. Nile also runs a popular WordPress community called All About WordPress on Facebook.
When Nile isn’t knee deep in blogging, graphic designing, consulting or coding, she has fun practicing Shoren Kempo Jutsu karate and other martial art disciplines alongside her son, who is a WordPress blogger too. You can find her on Twitter @blondishnet
Rachel Baker
Rachel started building websites in 1996, and has acquired a broad range of technical knowledge including front-end development, back-end development, API design, database architecture, systems administration, and QA testing. She started using WordPress personally in 2005, and professionally since 2009. Her contributions to the WordPress Community include speaking at WordCamps, contributions to BuddyPress, and contributions to WordPress 3.6 and 3.8.
Rachel has lead development on WordPress projects of all shapes and sizes including for high-traffic communities and Fortune 500 companies. She is a Senior Strategic Engineer at 10up, where her team is trusted to audit themes and plugins for security or performance issues.
Rachel lives in Chicago where she watches the Cubs lose, mentors new developers at Dev Bootcamp, relaxes with a Belgian style beer, and tweets at @rachelbaker
Randy Hicks
Randy is a NorthWest boy at heart, but lives in Nashville and loves it. He’s been helping cultivate the Nashville WordPress community since 2010 and is currently on the planning teams for both the Nashville Meetup and WordCamp.
Sam Hotchkiss
Sam Hotchkiss is the Principal of Hotchkiss Consulting Group, a WordPress development firm based in Bath, Maine. He is also the Big Cheese at Parka, the company behind BruteProtect, a WordPress security plugin in use by tens of thousands of sites. Sam’s background is in PHP development, and he has been developing sites with WordPress since 2004. He is currently traveling around the country from WordCamp to WordCamp
Teresa Lane
Teresa Lane is director of digital content strategy at Washington University. She stumbled upon the world of digital strategy after finishing graduate studies in literature and hasn’t looked back since. Teresa finds WordPress a godsend because it allows both sides of her brain to coexist in harmony; the writer/editor side and the SEO side can finally play nicely. You can find her on Twitter @teresaalane
Tom Harness
Tom Harness is a Us. Army Veteran, Teacher, Educator, and Business owner with 15 years of combined experience. He is an avid supporter of empowering and educating business owners and leveraging all forms of technology to increase revenue and efficiency. At the end of the day, he goes home to his wife and daughter, opens up his favorite craft beer, and watches his beloved Chicago Cubs.
Tom has been using WordPress for the past 3 years and uses it as a core foundation for his digital marketing business, Harness TechED. His team works with Start-Ups and Small Businesses on maximizing their online presence through Social Media Management, WordPress SEO plug-ins, and Email Marketing.Putting the priority on quality content and data driven reporting separates Tom’s firm from its competitors.
Will Hanke
Business owners and marketing managers hire Will to help them get better search engine rankings and higher conversions from their Internet marketing campaigns. Since 1997 Will has been consulting businesses such as Carhartt, Rockboard and Emerson on how to squeeze more revenue out of their website. He also authored an Amazon best selling ebook on Google Authorship for WordPress.
Missouri born and Air Force proud, Will is a huge float trip fan and can be found many summer days in a canoe with a fishing pole in his hand. You can find him on Twitter @techlh
