Clay Shirky studies the way communications tools alter or amplify social life; his current work is on large-scale collaborative networks.

Mr. Shirky is on the faculty at NYU’s graduate Interactive Telecommunications Program and has worked as an advisor or consultant to many organizations, including Yahoo, Microsoft, the U.S. Navy, the BBC, and Lego. He has also been an advisor to many social start-ups, including Meetup, Social Text, del.icio.us, Flickr, and Dodgeball.

Mr. Shirky is the author of the forthcoming book, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations, which examines the ways in which new forms of social media are allowing for new kinds of collaborative action.

He is attending DLD to better understand the transformation of the media landscape from multiple points of view.