Gina McCauley of Blogging While Brown

Called “the Dean of Black Bloggers and a woman who’s on the cutting edge of the internet and social media,” Gina McCauley is one of the most influential African-American digital media content creators in the world. In 2007, she was named to ESSENCE magazine’s list of the 25 Most Influential African Americans. She has written for ESSENCE magazine and ESSENCE.com, The Guardian, and The Observer. In 2007, she launched What About Our Daughters?, a blog dedicated to combating negative portrayals of African-American women in popular culture. The blog’s mission is to be uncompromising,unapologetic, and unbowed in defense of Black women. The blog is most well known for its fight to combat negative portrayals of African American women in popular culture and violence against Black women and children, but has evolved into an influential platform, sitting perched at the intersection of pop culture, Politics, and current affairs. Her blog readers have successfully lobbied large advertisers such as State Farm, Home Depot, McDonald’s, New Balance, Disney, and Yum Brands to pull their advertising from content that demeans and degrades Black women and girls. However, her greatest achievement is using the platform that she built to battle irresponsible corporate media as a platform to highlight underreported cases of horrific violence against Black women such as the Dunbar Village case, Romona Moore, and Dorothy Dixon. In 2008, she launched Michelle Obama Watch, a blog dedicated to monitoring the good, the bad, and the ugly media coverage of Michelle Obama. Within hours after its soft launch, MichelleObamaWatch.com was linked to by Salon.com and the Huffington Post. She has since been interviewed by the Wall Street Journal and quoted in the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, Newsweek, The Atlantic, the Boston Globe, the Norwegian Business Daily and others about her work on Michelle Obama Watch. Her blog posts have been quoted or mentioned on CNN, Entertainment Tonight, and the CBS Morning Show. She appeared on PBS and NDTV, India’s largest private producer of news, to speak about Michelle Obama. She has been interviewed regarding my blog on several NPR shows, the Tom Joyner Morning Show, RTE Radio 1 in Ireland, and XM radio. Her blog posts for the Guardian about the aftermath of Hurricane Ike were licensed to Cenage Learning and appear in the textbook Current Controversies: Disaster Response (vol. 1). In November 2009, Pacifica Radio launched her first syndicated radio segment on the show Woman, Body and Soul. She is the managing member of the McCauley Communications Group, LLC and in 2008, in response to a lack of diversity at large social media and networking conferences, she founded Blogging While Brown, the first international conference for bloggers of color. In addition to designing and implementing the curriculum for digital literacy training, she is a frequent presenter at some of the largest social media conferences in the world, including Blogher and Blog World Expo.

Deanna Sutton of Clutch Magazine Online

Sutton is the Founder and Editorial Director of Sutton Media Publishing, publisher of Clutch Magazine and soon to launch — Cullen Magazine, which serves as the brother publication to Clutch. After graduating with a degree in Marketing, Deanna Sutton set out to launch Clutch as a print magazine. After successfully launching as a regional magazine, she soon learned that the print publishing industry served as a bigger challenge than she expected. In 2006, Sutton saw a huge void in compelling and relevant online publications for young women of color In 2007, Sutton decided to take a risk and launch the first on-line magazine for young, contemporary women of color ‘ Clutch. Sutton’s vision was for Clutch Magazine to become one of the leading online magazines for multicultural women ages 18-35. With a passion for all things social media, Sutton recognizes the power and opportunity that the new media platform presents. At Sutton Media, she is responsible for business development, marketing initiatives, and editorial and creative direction.

J. Smith of jbrotherlove

J. Smith is a professional web designer/developer, as well as a blogger and social media advocate. His customer/client-focused career includes work in human resources at University of Illinois, coaching HR professionals at Georgia-Pacific, and directing marketing/public relations for Michael Jordan’s Restaurant and 30 Georgia-area Denny’s. Currently, J. is a web developer for WebMD, where he develops multi-level/high-volume sponsor programs using front-end web languages and refined skills in interface design and usability. Since 2002, he has created print, web and social media solutions for his own clients, ranging from corporate to arts organizations. A pioneer blogger in the mid-90’s, his blog, thebrotherlove.com (now retired), was one of the first to offer a black, gay perspective. The blog’s popularity exploded in 2002, when Slate.com linked to a post bemoaning the famous Joe Boxer commercial. Additionally, J. has written for Washington Blade, Southern Voice and the National Black Arts Festival; with select blog posts appearing on Racialicious.com. When not writing for the web and print, J. has moderated discussions on identity and diversity including a panel on television series The DL Chronicles and speaking at the inaugural Sex 2.0 conference.

Maurice Cherry of 3eighteen media and the Black Weblog Awards

Maurice Cherry is the lead designer behind 3eighteen media. His client list includes top telecommunications firms like AT&T and YELLOWPAGES.COM, big companies like AutoTrader.com and WebMD, national and state government agencies, start-up companies, and many more. Cherry holds degrees in both mathematics and network and communications management, and brings a high level of strategic expertise, future-forward creativity, and agile problem solving to 3eighteen media’s clients. Cherry also does independent consulting work and has several years of project management experience under his belt. Cherry’s passion for technology and good design is contagious. He writes for several technology websites — Techdrawl and Black Web 2.0, for example — on numerous facets of online marketing and branding. Cherry is also the creator of the Black Weblog Awards, which has gone on since 2005, and he just recently completed a position heading up the social media and web presence for the Borders for Atlanta Campaign. In his spare time, he enjoys cooking, playing video games, travelling, haphazardly spelling words the British way, and writing the next great science fiction series.