Geir Bækholt

Nomination for Geir Bækholt (aka. "elvix") of Plone Solutions AS, Norway.

Geir Bækholt, also known as 'elvix' in in irc to some

I have been a Plone contributor in some form since the start of the project five years ago. During that time i have contributed user interface design, CSS, javascripts, bug fixes, core components in Plone itself and add-on-products.
Managing director and co-founder of Plone Solutions AS, a Norwegian, but internationally oriented Plone consultancy and development company. My job involves managing a distributed workforce currently spanning 3 continents, 7 countries and 9 timezones. The company has close ties to the Plone community and contributes a fair share to the development of Plone and its surroundings.
An all-hands type person who enjoys working with people and organisations as much as writing code. I have a diverse background in marketing, design/art, sociology, film-science and web-applications. I worked 5 years with large scale web-applications in the gaming industry before i started doing Plone full-time.
In April 2006, Arranged the Archipelago Sprint, gathering 40 developers from around the world, spearheding the development of what will become Plone 3.
Speaker at all Plone Conferences but the first.
Currently collaborating with a regional university college on introducing more Open Source and Plone/Zope development into their master-level-studies.
Has a large interest in Open source business models, patents, marketing and licensing. Makes an effort of improving government- and general public awareness on Open Source in Norway.
Even though i probably represent developers and small businesses best, i meet and work with a lot of people in universities, government organisations, NGOs and larger companies, – and get to share their challenges and experiences with Plone, both on a technical and on an organisational level.

Seconded by Martin Aspeli