Cheryl Contee specializes in helping Fortune 500 companies, major non-profit organizations and leading trade associations manage their brands and their campaigns online with a focus on social media and blogger relations. She is also a blogger and co-founder writing as Jill Tubman on one of the top 10 black blogs online, Jack and Jill Politics. She has over 13 years of award-winning interactive expertise and previously served as lead digital strategist for Fleishman-Hillard for the West Coast in San Francisco. Before Fleishman, Ms. Contee led the interactive team as Vice President at Issue Dynamics Inc, a boutique public affairs firm based in Washington DC, was Web Director for Oceana and directed international website production and strategic communications in roles at Discovery Communications, Business Software Alliance and U.S. Institute of Peace.

Patrick Hynes is the president of Hynes Communications. He serves as the blog consultant for Sen. John McCain’s campaign for president and founded the blog Ankle Biting Pundits. An experienced political operative and consultant, Hynes has helped hundreds of candidates win public office. National Journal described him as “a hack with a pretty good record of electing Republicans; The American Conservative called Hynes “an expert on evangelical voting patterns'; and Campaigns & Elections named him a “Rising Star in American Politics.” Hynes is the author of 'In Defense of the Religious Right.' His writings have been published in the New York Post, Financial Times and USA Today, among other venues.

Liz Mair is the online communications director with the Republican National Committee, where she is responsible for leading blogger outreach efforts, contributing to e-campaign and communications strategy, and producing content for the GOP.com blog. Before joining the RNC in December 2007, Liz was an independent political consultant, columnist and blogger, writing for publications including the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, American Spectator and New York Sun, as well as at her own site, lizmair.com. She has consulted for various candidates and political organizations, both in the US and in the UK, where she lived for 10 years. Liz was previously a corporate lawyer in London.

DAVID D. PERLMUTTER is a professor at the William Allen White School of Journalism & Mass Communications, University of Kansas. He received his BA and MA from the University of Pennsylvania and his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. He has served as a Board member of the American Association of Political Consultants and now sits on the National Law Enforcement Museum Advisory Committee for its Media Exhibit. A documentary photographer, he is the author or editor of seven books on political communication and persuasion: Photojournalism and Foreign Policy: Framing Icons of Outrage in International Crises (Praeger, 1998); Visions of War: Picturing Warfare from the Stone Age to the Cyberage (St. Martin's, 1999); (ed.) The Manship School Guide to Political Communication (LSU Press, 1999); Policing the Media: Street Cops and Public Perceptions of Law Enforcement (Sage, 2000); Picturing China in the American Press: The Visual Portrayal of Sino-American Relations in Time Magazine, 1949-1973 (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007); (ed., with John Hamilton) From Pigeons to News Portals: Foreign Reporting and the Challenge of New Technology (LSU Press, 2007), and Blogwars: The New Political Battleground (Oxford, 2008). He has also written several dozen research articles for academic journals as well as over 150 essays for U.S. and international newspapers and magazines. He writes a regular column, "P&T Confidential," for the Chronicle of Higher Education. He has been interviewed by most major news networks and newspapers, from the New York Times to CNN and ABC and, most recently, The Daily Show. He is editor of the blog of the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas (http://www.doleinstituteblog.org/) and his own blog about online politics, http://policybyblog.squarespace.com/.