Key People

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Management

J. Sebastian Traeger, Founder, CEO

As CEO, Sebastian's the one to blame (or congratulate) for all that's good, bad or ugly at Razoo. Sebastian has spent the past 9 years starting and building various social enterprises. Previously, he co-founded, built and sold two web businesses: Christianity.com, a popular portal featuring news and resources and Silas Partners, a web consulting company that helps non-profit organizations with online strategy, marketing and fund raising. In 1998, Sebastian helped launch Village Phone, taking the lead for their operations in El Salvador. Once upon a time, he also worked as a management consulting firm, Dean & Company (lots of numbers, lots of huge companies, lots of fun).

Before Sebastian had to work, he went to Princeton University, where he played baseball, hung out with friends, generally squandered his youth and opportunity for a great education (but hey, who didn't?). He is active in the social good space through his church (Capitol Hill Baptist Church) and through various non-profit boards.

Sebastian is newly married - 19 months and counting - with each month better than the previous one! When he isn't working he likes to travel and compete in just about anything (and he likes to talk smack when he does).

(Source: Razoo)

Rob Giardina, Director of Engineering

Rob Giardina is Razoo's Director of Engineering, the humble shepherd of our computer systems. The secret to his famous tan is many hours spent staring into his 30-inch monitor.

Over his 15-year career, Rob has served in a variety of technical roles in both enterprise and startup software firms. Most recently, as the Technical Program Manager for Amazon's Web search systems, he was responsible for guiding the implementation of new innovations in search technology. At Amazon, search is the source of all revenue and the commitment to quality and constant availability developed there serve us well as we grow beyond our first baby steps and become a nexus for social change.

When Rob is not spending time with his lovely wife and five-year-old daughter, he is usually in front of a computer somewhere or lost in thought about the mysterious next stages of our Internet society.

(Source: Razoo)

Bryan Owen, Director of Product Development

As Director of Product Development, Bryan's primary responsibility at Razoo is ensuring the products we deliver are good (or coming up with good excuses for why they aren't). Bryan has spent the past 8 years in various technology leadership positions, from project and product management to Web strategy and marketing-- most recently as a consultant at Viget Labs (www.viget.com), where he led their Strategic Consulting division in Falls Church, VA. Bryan is a seasoned veteran of the Internet startup world (ventures now resting peacefully in the dot com graveyard) and has experience in the non-profit space, where he helped an insurance association apply their business model to the Web (www.nolhga.com) and championed some innovation among their membership.

Bryan has a wife and two young kids, which means he sleeps little and hums cartoon theme songs while he works. While he's out of the office, he enjoys just about any outdoor sport and serving at his local church. If you get him talking college football, you're in for a long conversation.

If Bryan could do one thing to change the world, he would work to strengthen families so every child had a solid support system-- by building strong marriages and local communities that make parenting a priority.

(Source: Razoo)

Jen Fraher, Marketing Manager

Jenn Fraher loves spreadsheets, a helpful skill as she plans and tracks Razoo's marketing efforts. Her previous experience at a web consulting agency and a business research firm come in handy as she plans email campaigns, crunches numbers and otherwise brainstorms ways to spread the word about Razoo and get others excited about the community.

When she's not thinking about marketing or the Internet, Jenn can usually be found reading (she typically reads at least one or two books a week), volunteering at her church, or thinking up another creative use for a spreadsheet.

(Source: Razoo)

Jason Witenstein-Weaver, Creative Director

When asked to submit a bio, Jason began sculpting a model of himself out of wet espresso grounds while using some custom built software to simultaneously video tape and edit the performance. He's always thinking with that "other" part of his brain. He's a bit of a geek and isn't afraid to admit it. Since coming on board as our Creative Director, he's been busy behind the scenes envisioning the future of Razoo and making enhancements along the way.

He's had oodles of experiences in all sorts of creative media though he's mostly sticking to the interactive stuff and has followed his passion from DC to LA to NYC and back. He's a bit of a startup veteran (i.e. a glutton for punishment) having experienced the joblessness of the dot com crash, lived to tell the tale, and still went back for more. All the while working with non-profits, grassroots, student and human service organizations to better serve their missions one design challenge at a time.

Jason has found a home at Razoo where his creative talent and passion for social good can contribute in a big way. We're expecting great things from him, and as soon as he's done with that espresso ground effigy we're hoping he's going to do some real work (and show us the video).

(Source: Razoo)

Gregory Trubetskoy, Senior Software Developer

Gregory "Grisha" Trubetskoy is our resident hacker (a.k.a Software Developer). While he does stare a lot into his large screen monitor, what most people do not realize is that he's mostly searching YouTube for the best Rachmaninoff performance. He claims to have been born and raised in Moscow, Russia, but nobody buys it because he has no accent.

Grisha's Internet career started with being a founder of one of the first Internet Service Providers in the Washington, DC area. He spends a fair amount of time contributing to Open Source software projects and is the original author of mod_python (google for it, it's all over the place). He's also a VP at the Apache Software Foundation.

If he is not near a computer (which is very rare indeed), then he's probably spending time with his wife and two children, playing piano or singing in his church choir.

(Source: Razoo)

Shai Chu, Operations Manager

First things first--her name sounds like ‘chai’ and pronounced like ‘shy’ but please don’t ask her if she likes to drink Chai and if she is literally shy. Secondly, if you have anything that needs to be organized, fixed or streamlined, Shai is the woman. She is our Operations Manager and nobody messes with her p-touch labeler (seriously).

Shai is originally from Shanghai, grew up in Hong Kong until she came over to the Land of Opportunity to pursue a college degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) at The University of Pennsylvania. Honestly, she would much rather have chosen Photography, Performing Arts and Ethnic Studies. After college, Shai explored several different career paths, from being a 2nd grade teacher to working in a global financial firm. She decided to settle here at Razoo mainly because of the people (yes, you guys!) and it brings warm fuzzies to her heart knowing that she’s working for an organization that strives to bring about positive change in the world.

Outside of Razoo, Shai enjoys dreaming about travel; the Maldivian Islands and Café Del Mar in Ibiza are definitely on her list. She loves dogs but until all stars align, she will continue to be dog-less. Shai also enjoys messing about on her keyboard and bass guitar and feels very strongly that music always sounds better when it’s super LOUD!

(Source: Razoo)