Conference

Jonny Sun is the author and illustrator of everyone's a aliebn when ur a aliebn too, the illustrated story of a lonely alien sent to observe Earth, inspired by his popular Twitter account. Jonny is currently a doctoral candidate at MIT and recently announced he’s illustrating Gmorning, Gnight, a collection of daily pep talks by Lin-Manuel Miranda.

A true polymath, Jean Grae is a legendary indie rapper, singer, writer, comedian, and actor. Her latest album is Everything’s Fine, a collaboration with partner Quelle Chris, with wide-ranging cameos from Hannibal Buress, Nick Offerman, Michael Che, and John Hodgman, who joins Jean at XOXO Story for their live variety show on Saturday night.

Jennifer 8. Lee is the founder of Emojination, a grassroots group aiming to make emoji more inclusive and representative. A New York Times-bestselling author and film producer, Jenny is also co-founder and CEO of Plympton, a San Francisco-based literary studio that innovates in digital publishing.

Beth Newell and Sarah Pappalardo are the creators of Reductress, the first and only satirical women’s magazine, brilliantly skewering condescending and outdated popular tropes in women’s media with cutting humor, including a newly-greenlit show for Comedy Central.

After his stunning live performance in 2015, we’re thrilled Open Mike Eagle is returning to the XOXO stage. Released in late 2017, his album Brick Body Kids Still Daydream kicked off a worldwide tour and Tiny Desk Concert. His latest project is The New Negroes, an upcoming comedy and musical series for Comedy Central.

Matt Furie is the illustrator and cartoonist best known as the creator of Pepe the Frog, a joyful character he was horrified to see co-opted by white nationalists and the alt-right as a mascot during the 2016 election. He’s fought to reclaim Pepe since, including a high-profile lawsuit to stop Infowars from profiting off his creation.

With reason, dark humor, and fabulous costumes, ex-academic turned video essayist Natalie Wynn makes ContraPoints, her YouTube channel tackling social justice issues with an eye towards reaching wider audiences than progressives alone, last month surpassing 4,000 supporters on Patreon and over 8 million views on YouTube.

By day, Demi Adejuyigbe is a comedy writer, currently for The Late Late Show. By night, he’s a relentlessly creative and prolific creator of great internet, from his absurdist parodies of Childish Gambino and Will Smith to his co-hosting duties on the Punch Up the Jam and Gilmore Guys podcasts.

Claire L. Evans performed at XOXO in 2014 as half of electropop duo YACHT, and returns to the XOXO stage as the author of Broad Band, her book telling the untold stories of visionary women in technology who helped create the internet as we know it.

Adam Conover is the creator and host of Adam Ruins Everything on truTV, an investigative comedian combating widespread myths and misconceptions with humor, pulling in supporting experts to debunk everything from circumcision to the prison system.

Helen Rosner is a writer and editor primarily focused on the culture of food, currently as the New Yorker’s food correspondent, and previously at Eater where she founded the longform and features department. This year, she was nominated for a James Beard Award for her loving ode to the Olive Garden.

Award-winning cartoonist MariNaomi created the Cartoonists of Color Database and Queer Cartoonists Database to spotlight marginalized comics creators, a labor of love that’s changing the landscape of comics.

Ijeoma Oluo is editor at large of The Establishment, and the author of So You Want to Talk About Race, her powerful new book that shifts the burden of explaining difficult conversations around systemic inequality from people of color onto white audiences.

Hari Kondabolu is an enormously talented standup comic and podcast host whose documentary, The Problem with Apu, made headlines and raised awareness of how the the popular Simpsons character impacted South Asian-Americans like him for decades.