John Emerson is an activist, graphic designer, writer, and programmer based in New York City. He has designed web sites, printed materials and motion graphics for leading media companies as well as local and international non-profit organizations including Amnesty International USA, Human Rights Watch, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and the United Nations. His writing about graphic design has been published in Communication Arts and PRINT, featured in Metropolis, HOW, and The Wall Street Journal. He co-founded the social media consultancy Apperceptive in 2006 and sold it to Six Apart Ltd in 2008. Since 2002, he has published Social Design Notes, a weblog of writings and clippings on design and activism at http://backspace.com/notes