The Program Planning Committee is pleased to announce the Vision Speakers for the 2018 Annual NASIG Conference, “Transforming the Information Community.”
 
[ Sören Auer ]( https://nasig.wordpress.com/2017/09/01/vision-speakers-for-the-2018-conference/#auer )

 Sören Auer studied Mathematics and Computer Science in Dresden, Hagen and Yekaterinburg (Russia). In 2006 he obtained his doctorate in Computer Science from Universität Leipzig. From 2006-2008 he worked with the database research group at the University of Pennsylvania, USA. In 2008 he founded AKSW research group at University of Leipzig, which he led till 2013. From 2013 to 2017, he held the chair for Enterprise Information Systems at University of Bonn and led a department at Fraunhofer Institute for Analysis and Information Systems (IAIS). In 2017 he was appointed as professor for Data Science and Digital Libraries at Leibniz University of Hannover and director of TIB German National Library of Science and Technology. Sören has made substantial contributions to semantic web technologies, knowledge engineering, software engineering, usability, as well as information systems. He received the ESWC 7-year best paper award and the OpenCourseware Innovation award. He led several large-scale collaborative research projects such as the European Union’s H2020 flagship project BigDataEurope. Sören is co-founder of high-impact research and community projects such as the Wikipedia semantification project DBpedia, the OpenCourseWare authoring platform SlideWiki.org or the spatial data integration platform LinkedGeoData. He serves as an expert for industry, the European Commission, the W3C and board member of the Open Knowledge Foundation.
 
[ Lisa Macklin ]( https://nasig.wordpress.com/2017/09/01/vision-speakers-for-the-2018-conference/#macklin )
 
Lisa Macklin, JD, MLS is the Director of Scholarly Communications Office, Library and Information Technology Services at Emory University. Lisa collaborated with the Library Policy Committee and the Center for Faculty Development and Excellence in Open Access Conversations at Emory. In March 2011, the Faculty Council endorsed an Open Access Policy that led to the creation of OpenEmory, a repository of Emory faculty-authored articles. In addition, an Open Access Publishing Fund was launched with OpenEmory, and provides funds to make it easier for Emory authors to publish in eligible open-access (OA) journals and books when no alternative funding is available. Lisa will continue working with faculty advisors as the Libraries implement these and other OA initiatives.
 
[ Lauren Smith ]( https://nasig.wordpress.com/2017/09/01/vision-speakers-for-the-2018-conference/#smith )
 
Lauren Smith is the a Research Associate at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. She co-founded Voices for the Library, a UK-wide public libraries advocacy organisation, and she is involved in the Radical Librarians Collective. Her research focuses on: political information behaviour, political participation and citizenship; information/news/media/digital literacy; critical approaches to education and librarianship; social justice, access, equity and inclusion in education and information.
 
The Conference will be held June 8-11, 2018 in Atlanta, GA. Please watch the [ conference website ]( http://www.nasig.org/site_page.cfm?pk_association_webpage_menu=700&pk_association_webpage=1228 ) for further information.
 
NASIG is an independent organization working to advance and transform the management of information resources. Our ultimate goal is to facilitate and improve the distribution, acquisition, and long-term accessibility of information resources in all formats and business models. Visit [  http://www.nasig.org/ ]( http://www.nasig.org/ ) for more information.