Plenary Speakers
The International Conference on the Book will feature plenary sessions by some of the world’s leading thinkers and innovators in the field, as well as numerous parallel presentations by researchers and practitioners.
| Rafael Ball | Vincent Kaufmann |
| Jens Bammel | Claudius Krucker |
| Herbert Burkert | Lucy Küng |
| Jochen Gotbrod | Wulf D. von Lucius |
| Tom Hall | Eric Merkel-Sobotta |
| Stephanie Jacobs | Ernst Tremp |
Garden Conversations
Plenary Speakers will make formal 30-minute presentations. They will also participate in 60-minute Garden Conversations – unstructured sessions that allow delegates a chance to meet the speakers and talk with them informally about the issues arising from their presentation.
Please return to this page for regular updates.
The Speakers
- Rafael Ball
Professor Rafael Ball is currently Director of the University Library Regensburg in Regensburg, Germany. After receiving his doctorate (Dr. rer. nat.) in biology in 1994 from the Institute of General Botany at the University of Mainz, he went on to train as a scientific librarian at the Library Management School of Frankfurt from 1994-1996. Following this, he took the position as the Head of the Central Library at the Research Centre Jülich where he stayed from 1996-2008 before moving on to the University of Regensburg. In addition to his position as the Director of the University Library, he also supervises diploma candidate and PhD students both at the University of Regensburg and the University of Dusseldorf.
Throughout his work, his focus has been on the practical and theoretical work of library management, scholarly communication, scientometrics and the development of new digital library services.
- Jens Bammel
Jens Bammel has acted as the Secretary General of the International Publishers Association since September 2003.
He studied law in Berlin, Geneva and Heidelberg. Following two years of legal training in Germany, France and Indonesia he joined the Periodical Publishers Association as Head of Legal Affairs, then Head of Legal and Public Affairs. In June 1998 Jens Bammel was appointed Chief Executive of the Publishers Licensing Society Ltd., the organisation that represents UK publisher interests in collective reprographic licensing in the United Kingdom.
- Herbert Burkert
Herbert Burkert is President of the Research Centre for Information Law at the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, where he also teaches Public Law, Information and Communication Law. He holds a position as Senior Research Fellow at the Fraunhofer Institute for Intelligent Analysis and Information Systems, St. Augustin, Germany (currently on leave of absence). He is serving as an International Fellow at the Information Society Project, Yale Law School, New Haven, USA, as “Collaborateur Scientifique” of the Centre de Recherches Informatique et Droit, Facultés Universitäires Notre-Dame de la Paix, Namur, Belgium. He is the Executive Board Member of a foundation for contemporary art in Germany.
- Jochen Gutbrod
Jochen Gutbrod is a part of the conference Publishing Panel on November 8.
Dr. Jochen Gutbrod, 47, studied economics in St. Gallen, London and Fribourg. He has held leading positions in Investment Banking in London, Geneva and Zurich. In 2003, he joined Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck as CFO. From 2004 onwards he was in addition responsible for Holtzbrinck Digital, building one of Germany’s leading Internet players with participations including Parship, myphotobook, MyHammer, StudiVZ, Brands4friends, Citydeal and Zalando to name a few. In May 2010 he took on the role as Chairman of the Executive Board of the Raffay Group in Hamburg and just recently has left Holtzbrinck to assume the role of CEO at Raffay Group.
- Tom Hall
Tom Hall is a part of the conference Publishing Panel on November 8.
Tom Hall is Travel Editor at Lonely Planet and the writer of the weekly Ask Tom feature in The Guardian’s online newspaper, and also contributes to a host of other magazines and newspapers in the UK, Ireland and Europe. Tom is a regular commentator on travel news and events in the media, including BBC Breakfast, gm.tv, Radio One, Sky News, CNN and Five Live. He is the editor and writer of Lonely Planet’s Best Ever Travel Tips book, a contributor to many more including the Travel Geek column in the award-winning Lonely Planet Magazine and a Contributing Editor and blogger at www.lonelyplanet.com.
- Stephanie Jacobs
Dr. Stephanie Jacobs studies history of art, German studies, philosophy and psychology at universities of Bamberg, Bonn, Berlin (Germany) and Perugia (Italy). Her doctoral work at the Free University of Berlin concentrated on German and French book illustration in the 19th century. Jacobs was awarded scholarships in Herzog-August-Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel, Bibliothèque Nationale Paris, and the Mellon Center of Yale University.
She has been the curator of many museums and cultural institutions. Since 2007, she has acted as the director of the German Book and Font Museum of the German National Library in Leipzig.
- Vincent Kaufmann
Prof. Dr. Vincent Kaufmann is Director of the Media and Communication Management Institute and Professor of French at the University of St. Gallen, St. Gallen, Switzerland. He also acts as Director of the Académie du Journalisme et des Médias (AJM) at the University of Neuchâtel in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. Prior to this work, he was Full Professor at the University of California at Berkley in the Department of French, where he acted as Department Chair from 1993-1996.
His main publications include, L’Equivoque épistolaire, Paris, Minuit, 1990 (translation in English : Post Scripts, Harvard University Press, 1994); Poétique des groupes littéraires. Avant-gardes 1920 – 1970, Paris, PUF, 1997; Guy Debord. La révolution au service de la poésie, Paris, Fayard, 2001 (translation in English : Guy Debord. Revolution in the Service of Poetry, The University of Minnesota Press, 2006); and Guy Debord. Œuvres, présentation et introductions, Paris, Gallimard,coll. “Quarto”, 2006.
- Claudius Krucker
Claudius Krucker is writing his PhD thesis on the definition of “Cultural Property” in the view of the international and Swiss regulations on the international transfer of goods with cultural value.
After his graduation in law at the University of St.Gallen in 2000 (M.A. HSG), he acted as assistant to Prof. Vito Roberto and joined the Bologna Reform Team of the University, which later became the Corporate Development unit. He has developed and introduced several new student-focused services for the University and conceived the concept for the internet and intranet relaunch. He is president of the Art Center in Arbon, Switzerland, and board member of proArte, the students art club at the University of St. Gallen.
- Lucy Küng
Lucy Küng is the moderator for the conference Publishing Panel on November 8.
She is Associate Professor at the Media Management and Transformation Centre at the University of Jönköping, Sweden, Senior Research Fellow at Ashridge, UK, and adjunct faculty member at the University of St Gallen. She is a Member of the Supervisory Board of the Swiss public service broadcasting corporation, SRG SSR idée Suisse, and from 2008-2010 was President of the European Media Management Association.
Before moving into academia, Lucy Küng had extensive experience in book publishing, starting her professional life as an Assistant Editor at Weidenfeld and Nicolson in London, and serving from 1988-1992 as Publishing Director at Random House UK. In addition to many articles and cases, Lucy Küng is the author of Strategic Management in the Media: from Theory to Practice (Sage, 2008), The Internet and the Mass Media (Sage, 2008), and Inside the BBC and CNN: Managing Media Organisations (Routledge, 2000).
Lucy Küng holds a Habilitation and PhD from the University of St Gallen.
- Wulf D. von Lucius
Wulf D. von Lucius is the Director of Lucius & Lucius Verlag in Stuttgart, Germany and has been with them since 1996. Since 1970, he has been engaged in honorary positions in the book trade, both nationally and internationally, with a focus on copyright. He was chair of the STM Copyright Committee from 1990-93, Chair of IPCC 91/92 and 97/98, Chair of the German copyright committee 1994-2008 and was on the IPA’s Copyright Committee from 1997-2000. Additionally, he has been a member of the Board of the German National Library since 1980. His published works include Bücherlust – Vom Sammeln (2000. DuMont) and Verlagswirtschaft (Second ed. 2007. UVK).
Beyond his work, he has a passion for collecting books of special artistic value (typography, illustration, binding) with an emphasis on contemporary artist books.
- Eric Merkel-Sobotta
Eric Merkel-Sobotta is a part of the conference Publishing Panel on November 8.
He is the Executive Vice President, Corporate Communications at Springer Science+Business Media and has spent most of his 20-year career in corporate communications and public affairs/lobbying functions, or as an external agency advisor in Brussels, Washington and Berlin.
He is a Founding Member and Member of the Board (2003-2009) of Stichting Lezen & Schrijven, Princess Laurentien of the Netherlands’ foundation to combat adult illiteracy.
In 2009, he was elected to the Board of the Börsenverein’s Berlin-Brandenburg chapter and to the Board of the International Association of STM Publishers. He also serves on the Advisory Board of the Berlin Central and Regional Library Foundation. Most recently, he was elected Chairman of the Board of the International Association of STM Publishers on 4 October 2010.
- Ernst Tremp
Since 2000, Professor Ernst Tremp has acted as the chief librarian of the Abbey Library of St. Gallen, and Professor of medieval history at the University of Freiburg. He studied history and theology at the University of Freiburg and at Sorbonne in Paris. He completed his PhD in 1980 and habilitation in 1986 at the University of Freiburg. His research concentrates on church, religious life and history of medievalism, hagiography, monasticism and history of libraries. Currently he is working on a new edition of St. Galler Klostergeschichten written by Ekkehart IV from St. Gallen (1060).
Tremp is active in many international academic bodies like Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Bayerische Benediktinerakademie and is a president of the Swiss committee for the digitalisation of medieval texts. Together with Professor Christoph Flüeler from the University of Freiburg, he initiated and directs the project “Digital Abbey Library of St. Gallen” (Codices Electronici Sangallenses, CESG), the aim of which is to create a virtual library and provide access to the medieval codices of the Abbey Library of St. Gallen.
