Michael Cronan is one of the founders of the San Francisco Bay Area postmodern movement in graphic design that became known as the "Pacific Wave", and a recognized corporate identity designer, acknowledged for the naming and the identities of TiVo, Verio, and naming Amazon Kindle.

Imaginative perception and innovation have been the hallmarks of Michael Cronan's award-winning design career, most closely associated with his native San Francisco Bay Area and now spanning more than 30 years. In June of 2009, he and Karin Hibma were named two of Fast Company's list of 100 Most Creative People in Business.

Scott Thomas is constantly seeking the simplest answer to complex problems. Scott began his design pursuits studying architecture before bouncing to graphic design and web development.

In 2007, Scott's career took a dramatic leap when he was invited to join the New Media team at Obama for America. The chance encounter led Scott to becoming the Design Director of the historic Obama Presidential campaign. He is currently writing a new book that explains how an obscure senator rose to the highest office in the land and celebrity status with the aid of branding and design.

Learn more at http://www.designingobama.com (where you can still preorder!)

A three-time entrepreneur, Jason is best known for his work as lead designer at Mint.com, the award-winning online personal financial management service acquired by Intuit in November 2009. Earlier, he founded Novaurora, a print and interactive creative agency, where he served as CEO as it grew into one of Pittsburgh Magazine’s “Six Hot Ad Agencies” with such customers as Coldwell Banker and Berner International. He also consulted to the interactive division of the brand agency Fitting Group.

Jason is currently Designer-in-Residence at Bessemer Venture Partners, is working on putting together a design/UX network, and can be found on Twitter at @novaurora.

Known and loved for his pixel perfection, Andrew Wilkinson is a Victoria B.C., Canada-based designer who runs MetaLab, an interface design studio. He makes all sorts of neat stuff for a living, and has worked with Harvard University, MTV, Mozilla Songbird, Sugar Inc, 280 Slides, and Mogulus.

MetaLab also started Ballpark, which thousands of small businesses use to send invoices, receive payments, bid on projects, and keep their team on the same page.

Andrew can be found at his personal blog and on Twitter at @awilkinson.

Dustin Curtis is a user interface designer and design super-advisor for startups. He works with startups in their earliest stages helping them to develop their brands, build their products, and hire their creative teams.

He is also a popular blogger at dustincurtis.com, where he recently caused a stir at American Airlines after publishing an open critique of the airline's inability to create a great customer experience.

Dustin can be found at dustincurtis.com or on Twitter at @dcurtis.

A Bay Area native, Rob Martin was exposed to design at an early age by way of skateboards, album covers and magazines. After receiving a BS in Graphic Design from Sacramento State University in 2007, he began his design career working for Chen Design Associates, Volume Inc., and Duarte Design.

In February 2009, he founded Majorminor, a 4-man multidisciplinary creative studio. Work by Rob and Majorminor have been featured in multiple publications and garnished with a handful of awards. Rob is currently a Senior Design Consultant with Oracle. Majorminor can be found on Twitter at @Majorminorsf and on Facebook.