2010: Keynote Speaker & Master of Ceremonies

ARIANNA HUFFINGTON

Arianna Huffington Exclusively Represented by The Washington Speakers Bureau

Arianna Huffington is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post, a nationally syndicated columnist and author of 12 books. She is also co-host of Left, Right and Center, public radio’s popular political roundtable program.

In May 2005, she launched The Huffington Post, a news and blog site that has quickly become one of the most widely read, linked to and frequently-cited media brands on the Internet.

In 2006, she was named to the Time 100, Time magazine’s list of the world’s 100 most influential people. In 2009, she was named as one of the most influential women in media by Forbes magazine and in 2009 she was named to the Financial Times’ list of 50 people who shaped the decade.

Originally from Greece, she moved to England when she was 16 and graduated from Cambridge University with an M.A. in economics. At 21, she became president of the famed debating society, the Cambridge Union.

Huffington’s books include:

• Pigs at the Trough: How Corporate Greed and Political Corruption are Undermining America, a New York Times bestseller, was published in 2003 and re-released in 2009.
• On Becoming Fearless….in Love, Work and Life is Huffington’s most personal book to date, offering a road map for achieving fearlessness in every aspect of life, a straight-to the point manifesto on how to be bold, how to say what needs to be said and do what needs to be done in order to find the freedom to love, lead and succeed.
• Picasso: Creator and Destroyer, a biography of Pablo Picasso was published in 1988. It was a major international bestseller, translated into 16 languages. The book was made into a film starring Anthony Hopkins as Picasso and produced by Merchant-Ivory for Warner Bros.
• The Woman behind the Legend, published in 1981, a biography of Maria Callas, quickly became an international bestseller.

Her 13th book, Third World America, will be published in late August 2010.

Huffington has made guest appearances on numerous television shows, including Charlie Rose, The Oprah Winfrey Show, Nightline, Real Time with Bill Maher, Larry King Live, Good Morning America, Today, Countdown with Keith Olbermann, The Daily Show, Squawk Box, The Colbert Report and The O’Reilly Factor.

She also provides the voice for Arianna the Bear on Fox’s The Cleveland Show.

She serves on several boards that promote community solutions to social problems, including A Place Called Home, which works with at-risk children in South Central Los Angeles.

Sal Pizarro

Around Town columnist for the San Jose Mercury News

Born and raised in San Jose, Sal Pizarro grew up as the tech revolution of the 1970s and 1980s transformed the Santa Clara Valley into Silicon Valley. Sal spent two years studying journalism at San Jose State University — and working nights answering phones in the Sports department of the San Jose Mercury News — before leaving his hometown for Santa Barbara. In 1993, he graduated with a degree in political science from the University of California-Santa Barbara, where he also worked for the award-winning campus newspaper, the Daily Nexus.

In the fall of 1993, he returned to San Jose and the Mercury News, where he covered high school sports before moving into editing jobs in both the sports and local news sections. In 2005, Sal took over for beloved Mercury News columnist Leigh Weimers, who had written his column since 1965. Sal’s column appears in the Mercury News six times a week, covering Silicon Valley community events and newsmakers from Palo Alto to Gilroy.

During Sal’s tenure he’s been able to be his readers’ ambassador to the fascinating people who live in Silicon Valley and some famous ones who visit. He’s cooked with Martin Yan, raced go-karts with the late Paul Newman and welcomed stars including Goldie Hawn and Shirley MacLaine to San Jose.

Sal received an award in 2007 from the Silicon Valley Arts Coalition for his coverage. He is a member of the Rotary Club of San Jose and serves on the community advisory board for Silicon Valley Reads, the region’s “one book, one community” program. Sal lives in San Jose with his wife, Amy, their daughter, Mia, and their dog, Chickenbone.