Head of Communities and User Experience, The Guardian (London)

Meg Pickard usually describes herself as a creative geek. As Head of Communities and User Experience for guardian.co.uk, she is responsible for developing and managing existing and new social web strategy and participatory experiences for The Guardian and The Observer. Her background is in anthropology: she conducted ethnographic research into community participation and cultural identity first in Bolivia and subsequently online in the mid-nineties before eventually succumbing full-time to the Internet industry’s bright lights over a decade ago. Since then, she has conceived, shaped and developed hundreds of editorial, commercial and community projects for big companies (like AOL, where she was Consumer Experience Lead for Social Media products & initiatives) as well as through consulting roles with a range of small start-ups, global brands and charities. Meg’s particular areas of interest are community engagement and the emergence of new forms of collaborative and participatory media. She has been blogging since it started with a W, and lives in London and online.