Brian Alvey is a leader in the online publishing space and has built more than two dozen content management platforms which have served thousands of popular sites and apps.
In 1995, Brian designed the first TV Guide website and helped BusinessWeek transition from AOL to the web. He built database-driven web applications and content management systems for many large companies in the ’90s including Intel, J.D. Edwards, Deloitte & Touche and The McGraw-Hill Companies. His 1999 Tech-Engine site powered over 200 online career centers including XML.com, Perl.com, O’Reilly & Associates Network, DevShed and Computer User magazine. He has been the art director of three print magazines and was the Chief Technology Officer of Rising Tide Studios where he developed The Venture Reporter Network, which was acquired by Dow Jones in 2003.
In 2002, Brian was the creator and host of the Meet The Makers conferences. In 2003, he invented and launched Blogstakes, a novel dual-entry contest product for the blogging community. Brian partnered with web design guru Jeffrey Zeldman in his Happy Cog agency and built content management systems for Capgemini, A List Apart and the Kansas City Chiefs.
In 2004, Brian Alvey and Jason Calacanis created the publishing company Weblogs, Inc. — home to category-leading blogs like Engadget, Autoblog, Joystiq, TUAW, TV Squad, Cinematical, Download Squad, WOW Insider and Slashfood. AOL acquired Weblogs, Inc. in 2005. While at AOL, Brian was named the chief architect of Netscape and lead the development team which turned the struggling portal into a thriving social news site.
In 2006, AOL acquired Blogsmith, Brian’s high-end blog publishing platform. AOL used Blogsmith to power hundreds of popular sites including Asylum, PopEater, Blogging Stocks, AOL Radio, Fanhouse, Black Voices, Spinner, The Boot, MMA Fighting, Paw Nation and Love.com. In 2009, 14 of the top 100 blogs ran on Blogsmith. Eventually, the massive portal AOL.com migrated to Blogsmith.
In 2007, Brian was the CEO and founder of Crowd Fusion. Crowd Fusion’s cloud-native content management system served websites and mobile applications for TMZ, Myspace, Best Buy’s Tecca, Warner Bros and NewsCorp’s iPad app The Daily. The Daily was the first app to support iTunes recurring subscriptions and was the first app to have its own Super Bowl commercial. He was an early investor and former chairman of the comic book publishing company ComicMix.
In 2012, Crowd Fusion acquired London-based Ceros and together they launched a realtime content marketing platform for brands. Brian became Chief Scientist and a board observer before transitioning to an advisor role.
In 2015, Brian launched Recurrency, a recurring crowdfunding platform for creators. In 2016, Recurrency shut down and the team started working on a social video app.
In 2018, Brian launched Clipisode, an app that lets stars make collaborative video shows with their fans just by sharing a link inside apps like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitch. After building native apps for iOS and Android, Clipisode launched their brand manager, a web dashboard used by Ogilvy, Nationwide, Dell, the BBC, AXS TV, VidCon, VMware, Warner Music, Fabletics and Discovery. Stars and creators who used Clipisode included Brad Paisley, Peyton Manning, Greg Cipes, Colleen Ballinger, Miranda Sings, Brian Posehn, Steve Burton, Bradford Anderson, Pete Wentz, Kira Kosarin, Kevin Frazier, Chris Melberger, Chris Pratt, the Property Brothers, Sylvia Brindis, Clare Mackintosh, Mod Sun and Lil Nas X. Clipisode was acquired in 2022 and their video platform was shut down.
Brian is now the Chief Technology Officer of WordPress VIP, an enterprise WordPress platform used by hundreds of media companies and brands including CBS, Nexstar, NBCUniversal, Al Jazeera, Rolling Stone, Hachette, Capgemini, Samsung, AccuWeather, Salesforce, Facebook, Tonal, News Corp, NASA, Vox and the White House.
Brian graduated from TCU with a degree in Physics and Astronomy and minors in Art and Mathematics.
Brian Alvey 