Supporters

The yMedia Challenge would never have been possible without the support of these people. Thank you so much!

Paul and Ingrid Minett and Clare O’Leary for their advice, mentorship and encouragement from day one.

Kate Tindall, Evelyn Gauntlett, Trevor Grey and Stephen Tindall for believing in the concept and helping us to turn it into a reality.

Janet Mazenier for her mentorship, and all the flights, journeys to Auckland, introductions, and the doors she opened for us when we were strangers.

Stuart Dabb and Manu Sharma from the Free Thinking Group for their weekend strategy sessions, coaching, and endless support.

Jen Rolfe and Andrew Stone from Saatchi & Saatchi; Nigel Parker and Paul Lo from Microsoft; for their participation and support from the first year.

Jon Beattie from Marker, David Turnbull and Brendan Jarvis from Chrometoaster, Natasha Hall and Mike Brown from Webstock, for their support from the start.

All our former volunteers including Haley Bishop and Tim Hagen from UberSavvy; and Demelza Round for making our first t-shirts; Yves Simard for generously giving up his time to film our first Awards Dinner; Sheena Rivera and Nathan Champion for their time supporting the 2008 Challenge.

John Blackham from XSol, for his enthusiasm, encouragement and guest speaking.

Miraz Jordan for the afternoon in her glorious sun-drenched home discussing our project, giving us ideas and feedback; and Tina Reid for her help in navigating the community sector.

Che Tamahori for his guidance, advice, sponsorship from the first year.

Bernadette Peters and Mason Herber from Media Design School; Jeff Lockhart and John Cockburn from Natcoll, Marcia Lyons and Douglas Easterly from Victoria University, Euan Robertson from Massey University, Jocelyn Williams from Unitec, Paul White from AUT, and Christine Woods from Auckland University.

Our past and present sponsors: Telecom, Microsoft, InternetNZ, Business Mechanix, Terabyte, GardyneHolt, APN Digital, IBM, Xero, Chrometoaster, Silverstripe, Recruit IT, Sun Microsystems, Creo, Mr Vintage, AUT and KFC. Our major 2009 & 2010 sponsor, nzherald.co.nz.

Terabyte and PlanHQ, who generously offered yMedia discounted office space.

Paul Matthews from the NZ Computer Society and John Clegg from ProjectX who unexpectedly picked up the bar tab at the 2008 Wellington Award Night.

The NZ computer society for hosting the yMedia accounts, and opening us to greater funding opportunities.

Thanks to Luke Nicholas from Epic Beer for providing the refreshments for 2008 yMedia workshops and Auckland Awards function; and the Southern Cross Bar for contributing a free venue and food sponsorship for the 2008 Wellington Awards night.

The Floating Pavillion who generously provided the venue, catering, beverages and staff for our spectacular awards dinner in 2009, and who will host the event again in 2010.

James Manttann and the boys at Skull & Bones for committing hours of their time to interviewing participants of the 2009 challenge, and piecing together a 10 minute video to start our 2009 Awards dinner.

The talented Hayden Hunter, and Ben Lilley from Pitch for developing our comprehensive website, of which we are so proud.

Reagan Qui for dedicating time to crafting our short video for 2010, and Adam Taylor for help to prepare the script, and offering us ongoing advice on spelling and grammar.

And to Chrometoaster, Terabyte & Running with Scissors for providing space for our weekly team meetings.