Sascha Meinrath has been described as a "community Internet pioneer" and an "entrepreneurial visionary" and is a well-known expert on community wireless networks (CWNs) and municipal broadband. Leading news sources, including the Economist, the New York Times, the Nation, and National Public Radio, often cite Sascha's work in covering issues related to CWNs. Sascha is the Research Director for the New America Foundation's Wireless Future Program. Additionally, he coordinates the Open Source Wireless Coalition, a global partnership of open source wireless integrators, researchers, implementors and companies dedicated to the development of open source, interoperable, low-cost wireless technologies. He is a regular contributor to Government Technology's Digital Communities, the online portal and comprehensive information resource for the public sector. Sascha has also worked with Free Press, the the Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis (CAIDA), the Acorn Active Media Foundation, the Ethos Group, and the CUWiN Foundation. Sascha holds a Bachelor's Degree from Yale University and a Master's Degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, both in psychology. He is a Telecommunications Fellow at the University of Illinois in the Institute for Communications Research, where he is finishing his PhD on community empowerment and the impacts and interactions of participatory media, wireless communications, and emergent technologies.

Victor Pickard is a doctoral candidate in the Institute of Communications Research at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His work on media politics, history, and policy has appeared in a number of scholarly journals, including the Journal of Communication; Global Media and Communication; Media, Culture & Society; New Media and Society; Journal of Communication Inquiry; and Critical Studies in Media Communication. He is in the final stages of his dissertation research, which examines the origins of the social contract between U.S. media institutions and the public that emerged from 1940s media policy debates.