Michael Albert is an American activist and writer. He has graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and he has founded with Lydia Sargent, Z Magazine and Z Net network, which supports political activism. Michael Albert has written numerous books and articles, along with the development of the Participatory Economics system, as an alternative to capitalism. He identifies himself as a market abolitionist who favors participatory decision making, as an economic mechanism to guide the production, consumption and allocation of resources in a given society.

Howard Zinn is a historian and playwright who participated in the Civil Rights and anti-Vietnam war movements. He was born in Brooklyn, in 1922, to a poor family of immigrants. He worked for a dockyard and later on, he joined the Army Air Force fighting against fascism in WW2. After the war, Zinn went to college through G.I Bill and earned his PhD from Columbia University. He became Professor of History at Spelman College and Boston University as well as Visiting Professor at both the University of Paris and University of Bologna. He authored more than 20 books and received various awards such as Thomas Merton, Eugene V. Debs, Upton Sinclair and Lannan Literary. His book, “A People’s History of the United States”, sold more than 1.000.000 issues in USA and the success of “Marx in Soho” theater performance, made him well known in Greece. In May his book “Declarations of Independence”, will be translated in Greek.

Noam Chomsky was born in 1928 and is one of the most respected intellectuals and political activists of the 20th century, with a profound academic work. He is Professor Emeritus of Linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Although Chomsky is the only guest who won’t be able to attend himself, he will participate online through the internet.

Vandana Shiva is an environmental activist, feminist, author of several books and a PhD holder in quantum physics. For the last 20 years, she has been one of the leading figures of anti-globalization movement, fighting against World Trade Organization’s policies and multinational corporations’ activities in the biotechnology sector.

Andrej Grubacic is an anarchist theorist and historian from former Yugoslavia, one of the protagonists of the anti-authoritarian movement that took place in San Francisco (homeland of the US Indymedia online network).

Chris Spannos is a political activist, who has over 10 years of experience in self managed media collectives. He has produced hundreds of radio interviews, written many articles and organized discussions and workshops. Since 2006, he has been contributing full-time in Z, focusing on Z Net and Z Com operations. He edited the volume “Real Utopia: Participatory Society for the 21st Century” (AK Press 2008).

Lydia Sargent is the co-founder and editor of Z Magazine. She is a writer, playwright and actor who founded South End Press Collective. Every year she undertakes the organization of Z Media Institute, in which she delivers classes.

Franco Berardi Bifo is a writer, activist and media-theorist. He has founded A/Traverso magazine (1975-1981) and was among those who set up Radio Alice, the first pirate radio station in Italy (1976-1978). Bifo has been a pivotal figure of the Autonomia political movement in Italy during the 70’s until he left for Paris where he worked with Felix Guattari in the field of schizoanalysis. In the 80’s he was a contributor for various magazines such as Semiotexte (NY), Chimerees (Paris), Metropoli (Rome) and Musica 80 (Milan). In the 90’s he published Mutazione e Mutazione e Ciberpunk (Genoa, 1993), Cibernauti (Rome, 1994), and Felix (Rome, 2001). Nowadays he is writing for Derive Approdi magazine and teaches Social History of Communications at the Accademia di Belle Arti of Milan. He is the co-founder of e-zine rekombinant.org and the free pirate television network Telestreet. The last few years Bifo’s writings emphasize on precarity at workplace and the broader implications it has in society.