Judges (A selection of prior year judges)

Xavier Alabart (2010)
Xavier Alabart founded in 2003 the A3E Association at the University of Catalonia. He is an Industrial Engineer by education and he got a Master of Science in Space Management at the International Space University in Strasbourg, an institution where interdisciplinarity and internationality are key areas. He got involved during four years in a satellite project with the Education Office of the European Space Agency (ESA). He is currently a consultant specialized in technology transfer and marketing, aerospace project management. Xavier is also co-founder of Aeroespacial.net firm specializing in aerospace Spanish.

Lou Anders (2010)
A 2010/2009/2008/2007 Hugo Award nominee, 2008 Philip K. Dick Award nominee, 2009/2008/2006 Chesley Award nominee/winner/nominee, and 2006 World Fantasy Award nominee, Lou Anders is the editorial director of the SF&F imprint Pyr, as well as the anthologies Swords & Dark Magic (Eos, June 2010, with Jonathan Strahan), Masked (Gallery Books, July 2010) Fast Forward 2 (Pyr, October 2008), Sideways in Crime (Solaris, June 2008), Fast Forward 1(Pyr, February 2007), FutureShocks (Roc, January 2006), Projections: Science Fiction in Literature & Film (MonkeyBrain, December 2004), Live Without a Net (Roc, 2003), and Outside the Box (Wildside Press, 2001). In 2000, he served as the Executive Editor of Bookface.com, and before that he worked as the Los Angeles Liaison for Titan Publishing Group. He is the author of The Making of Star Trek: First Contact (Titan Books, 1996), and has published over 500 articles in such magazines as The Believer, Publishers Weekly, Dreamwatch, DeathRay, free inquiry, Star Trek Monthly, Star Wars Monthly, Babylon 5 Magazine, Sci Fi Universe, Doctor Who Magazine, and Manga Max. His articles and stories have been translated into Danish, Greek, German, Italian & French.

Kevin J. Anderson (2006)
Award Winning SFF Author

Catherine Asaro (2009, 2012)
Catherine Asaro is a writer, physicist, singer, and two time winner of the Nebula® Award. Her most recent fantasy is THE NIGHT BIRD. Her latest sf book, DIAMOND STAR (Baen), is about a rock star in the future. Starflight Music released a soundtrack for the book, also titled Diamond Star, by the rock band Point Valid (Hayim Ani, Adam Leve, Max Vidaver). After Point Valid dispersed to college, Donald Wolcott joined the project as the keyboard accompanist for Catherine’s vocals. An accomplished pianist in jazz, rock, and classical music, he showcases the Diamond Star Project with his exciting arrangements and delightfully jazzy style.

Marc “Grailwolf” Bailey (2009, 2011, 2012)
Marc Bailey is the host of the Grailwolf’s Geek Life podcast. Marc is a reviewer, philosopher, and commentator on all things geek.

Keith Baker (2010)
Keith Baker is best known for creating the world of Eberron for Dungeons & Dragons and the storytelling card game Gloom. His sixth novel, The Fading Dream, comes out in October 2010. More information can occasionally be found at Have Dice Will Travel.

Veronica Belmont (2010, 2011)
Co-host of the science fiction and fantasy book club and podcast, The Sword and Laser. Also host of Tekzilla on Revision3 and Qore on the Playstation Network.

Matt Blum (2012)
Managing Editor of GeekDad.com

Peter V. Brett (2011)
Peter V. Brett is the author of the Demon Cycle, an epic fantasy series from Del Rey Books currently published in over 20 languages worldwide. The first novel, titled The Warded Man (The Painted Man in the UK and Australia) was nominated for the David Gemmell Legend award, and the second, The Desert Spear, was an international bestseller in hardback, making the Times list in both New York and London, as well as DerSpeigel in Germany. The series is optioned by director Paul WS Anderson for a feature film adaptation currently in pre-production. He has also published two Demon Cycle novellas with Subterranean Press, The Great Bazaar and Brayan’s Gold, as well as Red Sonja: Blue with Dynamite Comics.

Cliff Bohm (2009)
Cliff Bohm is the president of SlugFest Games, Inc., co-designer and art director on various SlugFest Games products such as “The Red Dragon Inn”, “En Garde!” and “Kung Fu Fighting”. When he is not working for SlugFest Games he spends his time learning to be a blacksmith, or working with leather or wood. Cliff escaped from a 14 year career in computer animation in 2007 (he claims that he is actually currently temporarily retired while he figures a job that does not force him to work in a cube). His credits include work on the animated films “Ice Age” and “Shrek the Third”.

Tobias S. Buckell (2009)
Tobias S. Buckell is a NY Times bestselling, Caribbean-born speculative fiction writer with four novels out, who grew up in Grenada, the British Virgin Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Dr. Ginger Campbell (2010)
Dr. Ginger Campbell is best known for her highly regarded Brain Science Podcast. She also hosts Books and Ideas and helps promote science podcasting via SCIENCEPODCASTERS.ORG. You can find links to everything she does on her website.

Gail Carriger (2010)
New York Times Bestselling author Gail Carriger began writing in order to cope with being raised in obscurity by an expatriate Brit and an incurable curmudgeon. She escaped small town life and inadvertently acquired several degrees in Higher Learning. Ms. Carriger then traveled the historic cities of Europe, subsisting entirely on biscuits secreted in her handbag. She now resides in the Colonies, surrounded by fantastic shoes, where she insists on tea imported directly from London. She is fond of teeny tiny hats and tropical fruit. The Parasol Protectorate books are: Soulless (Oct. 2009), Changeless (March 2010), Blameless (Sept. 2010), Heartless (2011), and Timeless (2012). Soulless won the ALA’s Alex Award.

Kyle Cassidy (2012)
[bio coming soon]

Dr. John Cmar (2009, 2010, 2012)
John Cmar is a physician specializing in infectious diseases, and a regular contributor to The Secret Lair podcast, as well as a gamer and libation enthusiast.

Tom Comeau (2009, 2010, 2011)
Tom Comeau started with Space Cat and Tom Swift, then read everything from Asimov to Zelazny.  He still reads everything from Acevado to Zahn.  After 18 years of supporting Hubble, he is now working on the software to focus the James Webb Space Telescope.

Frank Conniff (2009)
Frank Conniff is a comedy writer and performer who began his TV career writing for the Peabody award-winning Comedy Central series “Mystery Science Theater 3000” (MST3K), where he also played “TV’s Frank,” the bumbling yet lovable mad scientist. He currently writing, producing and performing on “Cinematic Titanic, ” with his old cohorts from MST3K, and “Cartoon Dump,” a monthly show at the Steve Allen Theater in Hollywood.

Anna Creech (2009)
Anna Creech is a librarian at a small, private university in the Mid-Atlantic area. She has been a podcast listener and sometime voice mail contributor for many years, and was proud of her a first generation iPod Nano that was sadly recalled and eventually replaced with a 7th gen.

Dani Cutler (2009, 2010)
Dani Cutler is a voice-actor, local radio announcer, political podcaster and all-around audio addict.

Richard Dansky (2006, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012)
Named one of the Top 20 Video Game Writers by Gamasutra in 2009, Richard Dansky is the Central Clancy Writer for Red Storm/Ubisoft and the author of five novels, including Firefly Rain. Richard has contributed to numerous best-selling video game franchises, including Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six, and Far Cry. His most recent title is Splinter Cell: Conviction. He lives in North Carolina with his wife, their books, and their inevitable cats. You can find him either online or in the bleachers at a Carolina Mudcats game. Take your pick.

Sheila Dee (2011)
Sheila is the Curriculum Manager for a technology based University. She received a Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education. She has a Masters of Education in Curriculum, Instruction, and Design. She has written three different curriculum guides for various New York Times Best Selling authors, curriculum for various universities, created professional development courses for schools and districts and spoken nationally on the benefits of social media in the classroom. Sheila is an avid reader. She can be found with the same book in various versions (all synced to the same page).

Pablo Defendini (2010, 2011)
Pablo Defendini is the Interactive Producer at Open Road Integrated Media. He worked in advertising and media production for large and small advertising agencies in the Latin American market before becoming Mass Market Designer for Tor Books in 2006, and then Producer for Tor.com in 2008. In his spare time he is an avid printmaker.

Charles de Lint (2009)
Charles de Lint is a full-time writer and musician who presently makes his home in Ottawa, Canada, with his wife MaryAnn Harris, an artist and musician. His most recent books THE MYSTERY OF GRACE (Tor Books, 2009) and a reprint of MEDICINE ROAD (Tachyon Press, 2009). Upcoming publications include new collections from Tor Books and Tachyon Press. For more information about his work, visit his website.

Wendy S. Delmater (2011)
Wendy S. Delmater hails from Lexington SC, where she married her webmaster and is living happily ever after. As editor of the acclaimed online zine Abyss & Apex Magazine of Speculative Fiction for the past six years she has brought you their unique blend of science fiction, fantasy and poetry.

Ken Denmead (2009, 2012)
Ken Denmead is the editor of the GeekDad blog at Wired.com. GeekDad covers parenting for the geek generation, including music, games and projects for raising our kids in our own geeky image.

Cory Doctorow (2009)
Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist, journalist and blogger — the co-editor of Boing Boing and the author of the bestselling Tor Teens/HarperCollins UK novel LITTLE BROTHER.

Michael Dougherty (2012)
[bio coming soon]

Paul Fischer (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012)
Paul Fischer is a podcaster and photographer living in the Washington DC Metro area. He runs the Podcasting and New Media track at Balticon and is the host of The Balticon Podcast.

Andrew J. Fox (2011, 2012)
Andrew Fox’s first novel, Fat White Vampire Blues, published by Ballantine Books in 2003, was widely described as “Anne Rice meets A Confederacy of Dunces.” It won the Ruthven Award for Best Vampire Fiction of 2003.  Its sequel, Bride of the Fat White Vampire, was published in 2004.  His most recent book to hit print, The Good Humor Man, or, Calorie 3501, was published by Tachyon Publications in April, 2009. It was selected by Booklist as one of the Ten Best SF/Fantasy Novels of the Year and has recently been republished by Ridan Books as an e-book.

Dr. Pamela L. Gay (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012)
Dr Pamela L. Gay is an astronomer, writer, and podcaster focused on using new media to engage people in science and technology. She is perhaps most famous for Astronomy Cast, a podcast she co-hosts with Fraser Cain (publisher of Universe Today). Each week they take their audience on a facts-based journey through the universe. In addition, Pamela blogs at StarStryder.com and works to create citizen science sites, such as IceHunters, that allow every day people to explore the universe. In her spare time she rides horses.

Thomas Gideon (2009)
Thomas Gideon is an award-winning podcaster, hacker, and social media activist.

Kirsten Gong-Wong (2011, 2012)
Kirsten Gong-Wong is the managing editor of Locus, where she has been since 1993. A native of California’s Central Valley (Porterville, to be exact), she attended UC Berkeley, then USC. In 1989, she returned to the Bay Area and has since refused to leave. Prior to working for Locus, she practiced law as a litigator. At Locus, she is responsible for production, advertising, general office management, and miscellaneous troubleshooting. She resides in San Leandro, California with her husband and daughter.

Dr. Kevin R. Grazier (2009, 2012)
Dr. Kevin Grazier is a NASA scientist on the Cassini Mission to Saturn, and is also the science advisor for Battlestar Galactica and Eureka.

Brian Gregory (2012)
[bio coming soon]

Val Griswold-Ford (2012)
Val Griswold-Ford is the author of the Dark Horseman novels Not Your Father’s Horseman, Dark Moon Seasons and the upcoming Last Rites, all from Dragon Moon Press.  She is also the co-editor of The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy: the Opus Magnus (with Tee Morris) and The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy: The Author’s Grimoire (with Lai Zhao), also from Dragon Moon Press, and has self-published the short e-novella Snow.  She is the editor of the pirate anthologies Rum and Runestones and Spells and Swashbucklers, put out by Dragon Moon Press as well.  She has published several short stories in various anthologies online and in print, and is owned by three cats.  She and her husband live in New Hampshire with said cats.

Marc Gunn (2010)
Called “The Godfather of Celtic Music Online”, Marc Gunn is a champion of the Celtic MP3. He has given away over ten million MP3s through his music and podcasts since he began his Celtic music career in 1999. Gunn plays acoustic folk music rooted in the American Celtic song tradition–-Celtic music, the Traditional and the Twisted. His vibrant live show and musical instrument of choice-the autoharp-makes him stand out as unique in the Celtic musical community. His award-winning Irish & Celtic Music Podcast earns over 40,000 downloads of each show and is one of the most-popular music podcasts on iTunes. Embrace independent Celtic music!

Gabrielle Harbowy (2009, 2010, 2011)
Gabrielle Harbowy is a San Francisco-based editor and writer of fantasy and science fiction. As an editor, she works with publishers including Pyr, Seven Realms Publishing, and Dragon Moon Press. She has worked with aspiring authors, first-time authors, New York Times Bestsellers and Hugo Award winners, and has acquired books that have gone on to become finalists and winners of awards like ForeWord Magazine’s Book of the Year and the Bram Stoker Award. As a writer, her short fiction appears in print and podcast anthologies, including When the Hero Comes Home (2011) – an anthology she co-edited with Ed Greenwood.

Dr. Harold Hickman (2006)
Professor Emeritus of Communication Broadcasting at Northern Arizona University

Erin Hill (2012)
Erin Hill is a singer, harpist, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, screenwriter, actor and science fiction geek. She’s had a #1 album on the Billboard world chart, and in the Top 40 on the Independent chart (2009). She’s a singer, songwriter and musician on the Dream Jam Band’s major label debut on EMI (2010). She’s played with Kanye West, moby, Enya, a-ha, Cyndi Lauper, Levon Helm, etc. and has played solo at The Royal Albert Hall. She is also known as The Pretty White Girl on Comedy Central’s Chappelle’s Show.

Martha Holloway (2010, 2011, 2012)
It’s all Paul Fischer’s fault that I got involved in podcasting. But I wouldn’t change that for the world.

J.C. Hutchins (2011)
J.C. Hutchins is a successful New Media storytelling pioneer and marketer, best known for his innovative use of written fiction, podcasting, video and fan-fueled crowdsourcing to create thriller stories, which he distributes online.  With more than 5 million episodic downloads of his fiction to date, Hutchins is one of the most popular “podcast novelists” in the world.  His work has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR’s Weekend Edition, Fast Company, Starlog, the BBC, Time.com, AdWeek.com, Wired.com UK, and BoingBoing.net.

James Patrick Kelly (2009, 2010)
James Patrick Kelly has had an eclectic writing career. He has written novels, short stories, essays, reviews, poetry, plays and planetarium shows. His books include Burn (2005), Strange But Not A Stranger (2002), Think Like a Dinosaur and Other Stories (1997), Wildlife (1994), Heroines (1990), Look Into the Sun (1989), Freedom Beach with John Kessel (1986) and Planet of Whispers (1984). His fiction has been translated into sixteen languages. He has won the World Science Fiction Society’s Hugo Award twice: in 1996, for his novelette “Think Like A Dinosaur” and in 2000, for his novelette, “Ten to the Sixteenth to One.”

Also with John Kessel, he has co-edited two anthologies Feeling Very Strange: The Slipstream Anthology (2006) andRewired: The Post-Cyberpunk Anthology(2007). He writes a column on the internet for Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine and is on the faculty of the Stonecoast Creative Writing MFA Program at the University of Southern Maine. He posts two weekly podcasts: Free Reads and James Patrick Kelly’s StoryPod. He was appointed to be a councilor on the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts and served as Chair from 2003-2006. He is the Vice Chair of the Clarion Foundation, which oversees the Clarion Science Fiction Workshop. He has also served on the Board of Directors of the New England Foundation for the Arts.

John Kessel (2012)
John Kessel is the author of the novels Good News from Outer Space and Corrupting Dr. Nice and in collaboration with James Patrick Kelly, Freedom Beach. His short story collections are Meeting in Infinity, The Pure Product, and  The Baum Plan for Financial Independence and Other Stories. His fiction has twice received the Nebula Award, in addition to the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award and the James Tiptree Jr. Award for fiction dealing with gender issues. His story “Buffalo” was voted best short story of 1992 by the readers of Locus magazine. His play “Faustfeathers” won the Paul Green Playwright’s Prize, and his story “A Clean Escape’” was adapted  as an episode of the ABC TV series Masters of Science Fiction. In 2009 his story “Pride and Prometheus” received both the Nebula Award and the Shirley Jackson Award. Kessel has taught American literature and fiction writing at North Carolina State University since 1982.

Greg Keyes (2006)
Award Winning SFF Writer

Dr. Alan R. Koslow, M.D. (2009, 2010)
Community activist who supports myself by being a vascular surgeon. I have participated in nine medical missions most recently two to Haiti, and have three potential ones planned for the next twelve months.I am the founding organizer and chair of one of the largest blood drives in the world at dragon con, last year collecting 6400 units.I am the chairman of the board of central Iowa American diabetes association and state advocacy director having received several national awards for my volunteer efforts. I recently lost 95 pounds and am organizing a book and talk on the subject. I am married 33 years and have three great kids (who all attend Dragon-Con yearly, how many Dads can say they have something their 20 year old children do with him every year). I am one of ten who conceived of and organized the first March of Dimes Walk-a-thon in New York City in 1971 . I conceived of and started the first program in the nation for High School students to get academic credit for community service in 1970 . I follow 175 pod casts and am addicted to 8 tv shows see two to three movies a week, read one to two books a week plus keep up with my medical journals. I have two radio shows I am a regular guest on one and one that is my own . I am heavily involved in science fiction, magic (performing) and the skeptic community. I have and again am running for the Iowa State Legislature.

Fran Kranz (2012)
Actor. Sports fan. Reader. Traveler. Foodie. Art enthusiast. Trouble maker.

Doug Kress (2009)
Doug Kress is best known for his involvement with the Parsec Awards in 2007 and 2008, as well as being the “Slice of Trivia guy” on the Slice of SciFi podcast.

Michael Laine (2010, 2012)
Michael Laine has been involved with Space Elevator research since the definitive 2001-3 NASA study. At LiftPort he manages a talented team from academia, government, commercial and military communities. Laine’s team has created carbon nanotubes, discovered a new metal alloy, and built robots that climbed a mile into the sky. Laine’s business management, coupled with his media, marketing and outreach skills have transformed this project from an obscure NASA paper study to a real world program. Laine is the President of the US Alumni Association for the International Space University.

Dave Law (2009)
Dave A. Law is the Chairman of the print/eBook publisher Virtual Tales. He is a veteran small press writer, editor and former publisher whose short stories, poetry, articles, and comic books have seen print in various publications over the last twenty years and is co-editor of The Complete Guide to Writing Science Fiction: Volume 1 published by Dragon Moon Press. He lives in Calgary, Canada with his wife and two daughters.

Gary Leland (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012)
Gary Leland has been involved with podcasting since its infancy. Creator of PodcastPickle.com, one of the oldest podcast directories on the Internet, has given Gary an insight into the world of podcasting few others possess. Gary has spoken at podcasting conferences all over the U.S. He has spoken at Podcamp New York, as well as Podcamp San Antonio. He has spoken at Dragon Con in Atlanta, New Media Expo in Ontario, CA, SXSW in Austin, TX, and the Blog World Expo in Las Vegas, NV. Gary is now creating a new media world for the sport of fastpitch softball. His newest creation is bringing podcasting, blogging, and vidcasting into the world of fastpitch softball.

Marianne Leviton (2009, 2010, 2011)
Marianne Leviton, an award-winning filmmaker, is President of Whistling Boulder Productions, Inc. which specializes in documentary and narrative filmmaking.  She founded the Boulder Filmmaking Incubator in 2006 to support independent and emergent filmmakers in the Boulder/Denver area. Marianne’s current projects include two feature documentaries: “Connected for Life”, a heartwarming and sometimes heart wrenching story of two men as they prepare for kidney transplants; the other, “Iron Justice”, explores the story of an Old West Town as its residents honor their wild past while seeking to survive in harsh economic times.  Currently in post-production is the short film, Dead Ringer, the first sequence in the Filmmakers’ Showcase Project.

Jane Lindskold (2006)
SFF writer

Geoffrey Long (2009)
Geoffrey Long is a media analyst and researcher at the Comparative Media Studies program at MIT.

Andrew Looney (2009)
Andy Looney is the Chief Creative Officer for Looney Labs, and is the designer of Fluxx, Chrononauts, Aquarius, Nanofictionary, IceTowers, Treehouse, and Martian Coasters. Andy is also a photographer, a cartoonist, a video-blogger, and a marijuana-legalization advocate. Andy lives with his wife Kristin (and their housemate Alison) somewhere near Washington DC. Andy is a Hippie, a Trekkie, and a Geek. He’s been an Eagle Scout and a NASA engineer, he’s gotten patents and won awards, he’s written a novel, he designed and coded a video game, and he once watched as his software was launched into space. Andy loves cake.

Julia Lunetta (2010, 2011, 2012)
Julia Lunetta is a professional geek and an amateur actress, musician, comedian and human. She arrived in Massachusetts many years ago for college, and repeatedly failing to escape Boston’s non-Euclidean roads, decided to stay. In addition to voicing Arkahn and the Winged Herald in “Second Shift”, she has been heard in Giant Gnome Production’s “Doctor Who: Legends of a Time Lord”. She also performs where people can actually see her, recently in an MIT production of “Sweeney Todd”, the original “2010: Our Hideous Future: The Musical”, and the off-Broadway BeBold! production of Sgouros/Bell’s “Phantom of the Opera”. In her vanishingly-nonexistent free time, she can be found on Xbox Live (gamertag: LeDiva), obsessively reading blogs, or generally cracking jokes at her own expense. On top of all that, she is the webmaster for the Annals of Improbable Research, and is on Twitter (@lediva).

Chris Martens (2010, 2011)
Fueled by a mix of unbridled arrogance, unrecognized ignorance, and an undiagnosed mental condition, Chris began podcasting in 2007 with “The Jesus Geeks” podcast which eventually transformed into “Twisted Geeks” in 2010. Chris joined the ranks of the Farpoint Media family of podcasters at the beginning of 2009. Being a life long geek, Chris has enjoyed sci-fi and horror in all it’s forms from movies to TV, books to podiobooks, comicbooks to graphic novels, boardgames to video games and RPG’s. Chris has even been known to LARP, twice now (first because of a woman, second because of zombies). His influences are Arthur C. Clark, Orson Scott Card, Frank Herbert, Joss Whedon, George Romero, Kevin Smith, Sid Meiers, Sailor Jerry, Scott Sigler, Tee Morris, and Jesus. Chris’ other projects include an audiodrama he started writing in early 2009 called “On The Edge Of Darkness” about a group of professional zombie hunters and a zombie centric infotainment podcast in 2010 called “Z Net Central”.

Chase Masterson (2006)
Named one of the world’s “50 Sexiest Women” by Femme Fatales Magazine, Chase Masterson was first recognized for her break-out role as “Leeta” in the final five seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Known to millions of fans worldwide, TV Guide’s online readers poll voted Chase the “Favorite Science Fiction Actress on Television”; Sci-Fi Universe Magazine honored her as one of the “Top 20 People to Watch in Hollywood”; and, in 2010, UGO included her in their list of the “Top 25 TV Hotties, and the Schlubs They Inexplicably Love.” In December 2009, AOL named Chase one of the “Ten Sexiest Aliens” in television history.

Kris Mayo (2010, 2011, 2012)
Kristin Mayo is better known as the Foodgeek or Kris the Cheesecake Lady from podcasts such as Wingin’ It and Speaking of Beer and is held personally responsible for the abandonment of many a diet by more podcast listeners than can be counted. She survived her three year internment as a member of the Parsec Committee (’07-’09) by constructing oversized models of cutlery, crafted entirely of Higgs-boson particles, soybeans and emu fur.  Upon release she returned to her previous employment as a Semi-Mad Scientist and Plant Wrangler and now resides in the wilds of North Carolina where she inflicts baked good on friends, colleagues and innocent bystanders when she isn’t listening to podcasts or breeding her army of sentient plants, which will eventually take over the world

Brian McLaughlin (2009, 2011, 2012)
Brian McLaughlin is a NASA Engineer and contributor to the GeekDad blog, generally writing on topics related to space exploration.

Helene McLaughlin (2011)
Helene McLaughlin is a core contributor to the GeekMom blog. She recently combined her love of Steampunk with her love of science experimentation into Lady Astrid’s Laboratory, a site filled with experiments you can do at home. Before her life as a stay-at-home-mom to two little boys she was a data analyst at the Space Telescope Science Institute.

Michael R. Mennenga (2010, 2011)
Michael R. Mennenga founded FarPoint Media in early 2006 and currently serves as its President, COO, and primary audio engineer. In addition, Michael is a co-host of the “Slice of SciFi” and “The Dragon Page Cover to Cover” podcasts, and contributor to many other Farpoint Programs. Michael has over 17 years of experience in the Broadcast Industry, but specializes in audio production. He is a certified electronic technician, receiving his technical certifications from Wichita State University, Central Community College, and California Institute of Technology.

Natalie Metzger (2010)
Natalie Metzger is an IT professional, engineer, artist, photographer, and robotics enthusiast. She currently illustrates several webcomics, including The Secret Lair, I Should Be Writing’s All Write!, and Radio Isopod. She is a frequent contributor of art and other content to numerous podcasts and blogs.

Rebecca Moesta (2012)
Because Rebecca Moesta (pronounced MESS-tuh) wanted to be an author since she was twelve, much of her writing focuses on teens. Her solo work includes novels in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Junior Jedi Knights series, short stories, nonfiction articles, and ghost writing. With husband Kevin J. Anderson, she wrote the Crystal Doors trilogy, fourteen Young Jedi Knights novels, six movie or game novelizations, lyrics for two Roswell Six rock CDs (ProgRock Records), a Star Trek graphic novel (DC/WildStorm), two Star Wars pop-up books, and original graphic novel Grumpy Old Monsters (IDW).

Christopher Mulrooney (2006)
Founder of Trek to the Troops

Lauretta Nagle (2010)
Former Astronomer/Engineer, Current Bookstore Owner

Joshua M. Neff (2010)
Joshua M. Neff is a librarian and web content developer for the Johnson County Library in the Kansas City Metro Area. He’s a lifelong comics fan and SF/fantasy geek. He blogs at goblin cartoons and tweets as joshuamneff.

Annalee Newitz (2009)
Annalee Newitz is the editor-in-chief of io9.com, a science and science fiction blog.

Dr. Ian O’Neill (2009, 2010, 2012)
Ian O’Neill is, in his own words, “a British solar physicist, the Discovery Space producer, science blogger and skeptic living in LA with my wife and five bunnies (of the four-legged variety, not the Playboy variety). I also maintain my own space science blog, Astroengine.com and am a contributor to the world’s best space blog, the Universe Today. Space science is awesome, it’s my job to communicate that.”

Tim Pratt (2009)
Tim Pratt is a writer and editor living in Oakland, California.

Bryan Prindiville (2011, 2012)
Bryan Prindiville works as a senior graphic designer and illustrator for the worldwide humanitarian agency CRS. In 2003, he decided to wander into the realm of webcomics with a newspaper-styled strip named