The Project Leadership Committee is a group charged with approving the overall direction of the organization. It identifies socially critical issues that need rapid solutions, chooses projects to accelerate those solutions, approves contractor hires, agrees on fund raising direction, helps with fund raising, reviews and approves financial reports, etc.
The Projects Manager is a member of this committee, and is responsible for scheduling meetings, coordinating actions, and in general managing the day to day activities except when those activities directly impact the Projects Manager. The Projects Manager also acts as the Project Representative to Software Freedom Conservancy. The current Projects Manager is Shane McCarron.
The current members of the PLC are:
Ann Bassetti
David Ezell, Verifone
David Ezell has worked in the Petroleum Retail Industry as a system programmer, manager, and analyst and since 1987. He joined VeriFone, Inc. in 1998, where he works on Petro and FinTech projects as a Principal Software Architect in the Global Technology Office. In 1998, he began participating in the NACS Technology group committees (Association for Convenience and Petroleum Retailing), and joined the W3C XML Schema WG in 1999. Subsequently, he has represented the NACS at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Advisory Committee since 2005, and represents Verifone on the Board of Advisors at Conexxus. He has been involved in work creating the following standards efforts over the years:
- W3C XML Schema 1.0
- W3C XML Schema 1.1
- Conexxus POS / Backoffice Interface (called “NAXML”) now up to version 3.5
He is currently participating in the Conexxus POS / Back Office Committee and the W3C Web Payments IG and WG.
Katie Harnitos-Shea, Deque
Katie is fascinated with science and emerging technologies with their potential to improve the lives of all, particularly person with disabilities, the under-served, and the elderly.
Currently she is Principal ICT Accessibility Architect (WCAG/Section 508/ADA/AODA) at Deque where she provides executive vision, implementation, and guidance for Accessibility initiatives in all sectors.. As a SME in US Section 508 and international IT/ICT accessibility standards, she is actively involved in W3C technical standard working groups as an Invited Expert since 2000 (WCAG, Web Payments, Privacy). Katie lives in northern Virginia where she loves riding motorcycles and horses whenever she gets the chance. She is ferocious about interoperability on the Web, and its ability to support human rights around the world!
Mark Sadecki, MIT (edX)
Mark Sadecki has been working in web accessibility for more than 15 years. During that time he has worked in Education Technology and Web Standards. He is currently the Accessibility Coordinator at edX, responsible for ensuring that their software platform and mobile applications are accessible to all learners. Previously, he served as the Staff Contact for the HTML Accessibility Task Force at the W3C where he managed the progress of accessibility support in HTML5. He has a particular interest in accessible graphics, especially SVG and the HTML5 canvas element, as well as digital credentials, identity, and privacy. The accessibility community is more aware than most of the importance of web standards and interoperability. Without consensus and standards for how technology will work, those who create assistive technology, designed to bridge the gap and provide access to users with disabilities, have no foundation to build on. Mark is proud to be involved in Spec-Ops and its very important mission.
Marta Piekarska, Blockstream
Marta Piekarska is a privacy and security enthusiast with a focus on user informed design: a field she popularized through her PhD thesis. She is about to receive her doctorate at the Technical University in Berlin. Previously Marta worked with Deutche Telekom and Mozilla on Firefox OS to bring user-driven privacy features to mobile devices. Marta received dual degrees with a Master’s in Computer Science from Technical University in Berlin and Warsaw University of Technology and a Bachelor’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering. When not at work Marta cooks, reads, enjoys working out and loves travelling.
Manu Sporny, Digital Bazaar
Manu Sporny has founded or helped start six software technology start-ups and organizations. He has been the Chairman for the RDFa, JSON-LD, Web Payments, Permanent Identifiers, and Credentials Community Groups at W3C and has been the Editor for multiple W3C and IETF specifications related to Linked Data, Cryptography, Web Payments, and Credentials. A champion for science and the arts, his life’s work is focused on empowering people to enact global change through the Web. He is currently focused on standardizing the core infrastructure of the Web to include payments, verifiable claims and credentials, and a variety of other transparent-by-design financial services that will become the foundation of a more efficient and fair economy. Read more at Manu's blog and on his LinkedIn page.
Shane McCarron, Shane is Shane Company
Shane McCarron has been working on standards and standards-related activities since joining the ANSI-C committee (X3J11) in 1985. Shortly thereafter he started work on what became POSIX (becoming part of the POSIX executive committee), joined the staff at UNIX International (as Project Manager responsible for the System V Interface Definition, Internationalization, Licensing), and later worked with The Open Group (doing Validation, Certification, and Standards development work). During that time he worked closely with The Open Software Foundation, The Object Management Group, The X Consortium, 88Open, ISO, and a variety of other organizations - working on countless standards, test suites, and infrastructure projects to support standards and validation. Most recently he has focused on W3C Recommendation work, with special attention to Accessibility and Extensibility of the Web Platform. A few of the specifications he has worked on include:
- IEEE POSIX .1, .2, .3
- W3C XHTML 1.0
- W3C XHTML Modularization, XHTML 1.1, XHTML Print, XHTML Basic
- XHTML 2
- RDFa Core