Omar El Akkad is an author and journalist. His work earned a National Newspaper Award for Investigative Journalism. His debut novel, American War, is an international bestseller, listed as one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, Washington Post, GQ, NPR, and Esquire and was selected by the BBC as one of 100 novels that changed our world.

Dave Anthony is a video game producer most known for leading the design and production of games in the Call of Duty series, the best-selling entertainment product in history.

Madeline Ashby is an acclaimed author and futurist who specializes in scenario development and science fiction prototypes. Her books include The First Machine Dynasty, Company Town, and How to Future: Leading and Sense-making in an Age of Hyperchange. She is a member of the AI Policy Futures Group at the ASU Center for Science and the Imagination and the XPRIZE Sci-Fi Advisory Council.

Joshua Baughman currently serves as an Analyst at Air University’s China Aerospace Studies Institute (CASI), where his research centers on China’s activity in the cyber and information domains and the PLA Rocket Force. He is also the Chief Marketing Officer of the Military Cyber Professionals Association.

David Benioff is the co-creator, writer, and showrunner of the cultural phenomenon HBO’s Game of Thrones, the most awarded TV show in Emmy history. He also wrote 25th Hour, Troy, City of Thieves, and co-wrote X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

Peter Blake is an Emmy Award-winning writer and producer, who has worked on shows like House, Gotham, Billions, El Candidato, and The Good Doctor.

Leo Blanken is an associate professor in the Defense Analysis Department at the Naval Postgraduate School, where he also serves as the deputy director of the Consortium for Robotics and Unmanned Systems Education and Research.

Michael Brasseur, US Navy retired Commander, is the Chief Strategy Officer at SAAB. A 26-year Navy veteran, Brasseur commanded the USS Fort Worth littoral combat ship and the USS Whirlwind, was Director of NATO's Maritime Unmanned Systems Innovation & Coordination Cell, as well as founded and served as the first commodore of the Navy’s Task Force 59, the Navy’s test bed for unmanned and artificial intelligence technologies.

Phillip Breedlove, USAF retired General, served as Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and the Commander of U.S. European Command. During 39 years of service, he also served as Commander of U.S. Air Forces Europe and Africa, Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force, and Assistant Chief of Staff for Air Operations, Plans, and Requirements, where he co-authored the original Air-Sea Battle Concept. He is a Distinguished Professor at the Nunn School of International Affairs at Georgia Tech.

Emerson Brooking is a Senior Fellow at the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) of the Atlantic Council, where he leads a team of researchers focused on the study of information conflicts around the world. He previously was a Cyber Policy Advisor within the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, where he was an author of the 2023 DoD Cyber Strategy. Brooking is also the coauthor of LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media.

Joe Byerly is the founder and director of From the Green Notebook, a platform that explores the art of military leadership and a Non-Resident Fellow at the Modern War Institute at the United States Military Academy. A retired Army Lt. Colonel, he is a combat and arms officer with over 20 years of experience, including multiple positions within Joint Special Operations Command, including as the special advisor to the commander of Resolute Support Mission, Afghanistan.

Debora Cahn is an Emmy-nominated writer, producer, and showrunner of The Diplomat. She has worked on a wide variety of dramatic projects, from The West Wing to Grey’s Anatomy to serving as Executive Producer of Homeland.

Tim Carter is a Vancouver-based video game and movie creator with Contradiction. He has written or consulted on acclaimed games like Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell, Need For Speed, Mod Nation Racer, and Sleeping Dogs and worked with publishers such as Square Enix, Sony, Ubisoft, and Amazon. 

ML (Matt) Cavanaugh, PhD, is a retired US Army Lieutenant Colonel and Strategist and a co-founder of the Modern War Institute at West Point. Also a co-founder of the Military Writers Guild, he is the editor of two books on strategy lessons crossing fiction and history, has written for outlets like the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, as well as runs the noted weekly newsletter service Strategy Notes, which shares insights for strategy and strategies for insight.

August Cole is a best-selling author, futurist, and co-founder of Useful Fiction LLC. A former Wall Street Journal and Marketplace reporter, he is the co-author of such noted books as Ghost Fleet and Burn-In.

Emma De Angelis is Director of Publications/Editor at RUSI Journal, one of the world's most historic and respected policy journals, published since 1857.

Keith Dear is Director of Artificial Intelligence Innovation at Fujitsu Defence and Security. Keith has served as an Expert Advisor to the Prime Minister on Defence Modernisation & the Integrated Review, leading also on UK space strategy in No 10 Downing, and advising on national strategies on emerging technology.

S.B. Divya is an electrical engineer in pattern recognition, machine intelligence, high speed communications, digital music, and medical devices, who then shifted to writing, becoming the Hugo and Nebula Award-nominated author of such books as Runtime, Machinehood, and Contingency Plans For the Apocalypse and Other Possible Situations. Divya is also the co-editor of the weekly science fiction podcast Escape Pod.

Joseph Dyer, US Navy retired Vice Admiral, served as Commander, Naval Air Systems Command, as the Navy’s Chief Test Pilot, and as manager of the F-18 fighter jet program. After retirement, he was Chief Operating Officer and Chief Strategy Officer at iRobot Corp.

Sir Lawrence David Freedman is a best-selling author of history and strategy and Emeritus Professor of War Studies at King's College London. He has been described as the "dean of British strategic studies."

George Galdorisi is a retired Navy Captain, who served as a Top Gun aviator. He has gone on to  write fifteen books, including multiple New York Times bestsellers in the Tom Clancy OpCenter series. He also serves as Director of Strategic Assessments and Technical Futures at the Navy’s Command and Control Center of Excellence.

Carrie Gillogly is the Director of Drama Series at Netflix. She previously was Co-Head of Scripted Programming at the AMC TV Network and helped create movie projects such as Gran Torino and A Star Is Born.

Jeremy Gold is a Hollywood Television Executive. He has worked at Blumhouse and Fox, where he helped develop series such as American Dad, The Bernie Mac Show, The Loudest Voice, Sharp Objects, Good Lord Bird, and Arrested Development. 

Howard Gordon is an Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning writer and producer, who created such hit TV shows as 24 and Homeland.

Greg Grant is a senior advisor for the Special Competitive Studies Project. Previously, he served as a senior principal at MITRE’s National Security Sector, focused on the operational implications of emerging technologies, and as senior director of strategy at the Defense Innovation Unit.

Sam Hargrave is a Hollywood director, actor, stunt coordinator, and stuntman. He coordinated the acclaimed action sequences of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, from Captain America: Civil War to Avengers Endgame, as well as such movies as Atomic Blonde and Deadpool 2. He is also the director of Extraction and Extraction 2, as well as on season two of The Mandalorian.

James Isenhower is a US Army Major General and Commanding General of the 1st Armored Division and Fort Bliss. He previously served as the first Commander of the US Army’s Multi-Domain Task Force.

Nina Jacobsen is a Hollywood producer who Forbes magazine has named one of "The World's 100 Most Powerful Women." Her projects include The Sixth Sense, Remember the Titans, Pearl Harbor, The Princess Diaries, and Pirates of the Caribbean. Since 2007, she’s run her own production company, Colorforce, where she has produced hits such as The Hunger Games, Crazy Rich Asians, and American Crime Story.

Amanda Johnson-Zetterstrom is Co-Executive Producer of the award-winning Netflix series YOU. She has also written for several hit television shows including The Diplomat, Purity, and original pilots for Netflix and Warner Brothers. She was a founding member of the New York–based production company Animal Kingdom, and has been awarded the SXSW Grand Jury & Audience Award.

Gene Klein is a producer and creative executive currently serving as an Executive Producer on Netflix’s CIA dramedy The Recruit. He has over two decades of experience developing and producing television series and pilots, including USA Network’s hit drama Suits, the sci-fi drama Impulse, and USA’s Golden Globe-nominated spy drama Covert Affairs. Gene also previously worked at HBO in strategic planning and content acquisitions.

Sir Richard Knighton is Air Chief Marshal and Chief of the Air Staff of the Royal Air Force, as well as Aide-de-Camp to His Majesty King Charles.

Lindsey Liberatore is Executive Vice President-Television at Rideback Entertainment and prior to that Vice President for Sony Pictures Television's TriStar label. She has worked on projects ranging from TV shows like Walker and Avatar: The Last Airbender to movies like Man on Fire.

Ken Liu is the author of multiple best-selling science fiction and fantasy books, a winner of the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy awards the inventor of the “silkpunk” genre bringing together traditions of engineering and East Asia’s classical antiquity and aesthetics., as well as translator of the acclaimed Three Body Problem series.

Caryn Mandabach is an Emmy and BAFTA award-winning producer of shows such as The Cosby Show, Roseanne, 3rd Rock from the Sun, That '70s Show, Nurse Jackie, and, most recently, Peaky Blinders.

Chloe Sophia Maxmin is an environmental activist currently serving as the Maine State Senator for District 13. Her surprising win in a rural district led to her being profiled in national media as a new political model and named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone.

David McCloskey is a former CIA analyst and the critically acclaimed author of Moscow X and Damascus Station. While at the CIA, David wrote regularly for the President’s Daily Brief, delivered classified testimony as well as worked in CIA field stations across the Middle East.

Kathleen McInnis, PhD, is senior fellow and director of the Smart Women, Smart Power Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and former CRS senior expert to Congress on strategy and irregular warfare. She is also the author of the novel The Heart of War.

Bruce Mehlman is a partner at Mehlman Castagnetti, one of Washington’s leading policy advisory firms. Bruce previously served as Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Technology Policy under President George W. Bush. He also worked as a senior leadership aide in the House of Representatives, general counsel to a national political party committee, and policy counsel to Cisco Systems.

General Austin “Scott” Miller, US Army retired, is Executive Chairman at PrairieFire and served as the final commander of US Forces in Afghanistan. As the most deployed leader in the Global War on Terror, General Miller has led Joint Special Operations Command, the US Army Maneuver Center of Excellence, Combined Forces Special Operations Component Command in Afghanistan, and the Task Force Ranger assault force in Mogadishu.

Chunka Mui is a futurist and innovation advisor for Fortune 500 firms. He created The Exchange conference series of business leaders and is the author of A Brief History of a Perfect Future,  Unleashing the Killer App: Digital Strategies for Market Dominance, and Billion-Dollar Lessons: What You Can Learn from the Most Inexcusable Business Failures of the Last 25 Years.

Jeffrey Nachmanoff is a movie and TV director and writer. He has written such blockbuster movies as Day After Tomorrow, as well as directed for shows like Detroit 187 (ABC), Chicago Fire (NBC), Hostages (CBS), Homeland (Showtime), Lovecraft Country (HBO), and Chicago PD (NBC)

Robert B. Neller is a retired USMC General, who served as the 37th Commandant of the United States Marine Corps.

Annalee Newitz is the science writer for the New York Times, a monthly columnist in New Scientist, author of the books Four Lost Cities: A Secret History of the Urban Age, The Future of Another Timeline, and Autonomous, as well as co-host of the Hugo Award-winning podcast Our Opinions Are Correct.

John Orloff is a Hollywood screenwriter. He has written projects ranging from the acclaimed World War II drama HBO’s Band of Brothers to A Mighty Heart, the biography of Marianne Pearl, and Legends of the Guardians, a 3D animated movie. His most recent project is Masters of the Air, a war drama miniseries based on the actions of the Eighth Air Force of the United States Army Air Forces during World War II.

Niloofar Razi Howe has been an investor, executive, and entrepreneur in the tech industry for over 25 years. She has served as Chief Strategy Officer at RSA, a global cybersecurity company, a Sr. Operating Partner at Energy Impact Partners and is on the boards of Morgan Stanley Bank, NA, Recorded Future, Tenable and the National Security Agency.

John M. Richardson is a retired United States Navy Admiral, who served as the 31st Chief of Naval Operations (CNO). He previously commanded the submarine USS Honolulu, as well as lead the Navy’s Director of the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program.

General Lori Robinson is a retired United States Air Force General, who served as Commander, United States Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command. She was the first female officer in the United States Armed Forces’ history to command a major Unified Combatant Command.

James Roddis is a Major General in the British Army and the Director of Strategy for the UK military’s Strategic Command.

Mick Ryan is a retired Australian Army Major General, who commanded at the Troop, Squadron, Regiment, Task Force, and Brigade levels during his three-decade career. He served as Director General Training and Doctrine for the Australian Army and Commander of the Australian Defense College, where he founded the “Perry Group” project to foster a forward-thinking and creative mindset.

Mark Sable is the creator and writer of game-changing graphic novels exploring human (and supernatural) conflict such as Graveyard of Empires.

Matthew Sand is a Hollywood screenwriter. His projects include Deepwater Horizon and the upcoming sequel to the 2012 action film Act of Valor, Captains Courageous, and The Man Who Robbed Al Qaeda.

Ted Schlein is a leading cybersecurity and enterprise technology investor at the venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins. He serves on the NSA, IQT, and Dept. of Homeland Security advisory boards.

Hope Seck is an award-winning reporter and editor. She was the managing editor for Military.com and is a member of the board of directors at the Military Reporters and Editors Association.

Brad Shelton is the Vice President of Creative and Story at BRC Imagination Arts, a narrative consultant, and a storytelling thought leader. Previously, Brad served as a storytelling and narrative consultant for companies such as Caterpillar and Chick-fil-A and worked with MITRE and DoD on projects related to rebuilding the American Narrative for the 21st Century.

Peter W. Singer is a New York Times Bestselling author of both non-fiction and fiction, strategist at New America, and co-founder of Useful Fiction. No author, living or dead, has more books on the military professional reading lists. 

Jennifer Strong is the host and creator of SHIFT, a podcast that examines our ever-changing trust in automation and emerging technologies. Strong previously created tech podcasts for ProPublica, The Wall Street Journal, and MIT Technology Review. She has won six Webby and three Podcast Academy Award nominations.

Jonathan Lloyd Walker is an actor, producer, and screenwriter. He has appeared in such films as Red, Shooter, Along Came a Spider, The Thing, and Land of the Dead, television series like The West Wing, Men in Trees, The Outer Limits and Smallville. As a writer and producer, his credits include Continuum, Wu Assassins, The Murders, Private Eyes, and Van Helsing.

Tom Weis is a renowned industrial designer and faculty member at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).

Dan Weiss is the co-creator, writer, and showrunner of the cultural phenomenon HBO Game of Thrones, the most awarded TV show in Emmy history,

Daniel Wilson is a PHD Roboticist and New York Times Best Selling Author. Among his books are Robopocalypse and The Andromeda Evolution.

Marci Wiseman is a Hollywood executive and producer. She served at Blumhouse Television and AMC, where she launched shows like The Walking Dead, Halt and Catch Fire, The Loudest Voice, Sharp Objects, and Good Lord Bird.

Matt Yocum is a retired colonel from the U.S. Air Force. Among his assignments were serving as Director of the Commander’s Action Group for U.S. Central Command and as the Director of Strategic Plans, Policy, and Futures at the Joint Special Operations Command. Matt is also an award-winning author, whose writing ranges from technical engineering articles to short stories for Marvel Comics.