Media Rights Technologies

Hank Risan studied architectural theory and design with the well-known scholar Reyner Banham and continues to place great emphasis on restoration, preservation and conservation of historical elements. As founder and chairman of the board at The MoMI (/www.themomi.org), America's first virtual musical instrument museum, Risan has consistently played a role in musical instrument preservation by collaborating in, and donating to, large-scale exhibitions with the Smithsonian Institution as well as the world-renowned Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. He began searching for vintage Martin guitars when he was 17 and has spent the past 25 years assembling a vast collection of the finest 19th and 20th Century instruments. A renowned vintage guitar dealer and restoration artist, Risan has advised numerous historians and helped clients establish important collections, many instruments from which have been displayed in museums, books, and magazines. Part of his own collection was shown with prominent paintings from the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in an exhibition titled The Guitar Is Art.

Although Risan has produced museum exhibitions of musically historical figures from Woody Guthrie to Lloyd Loar, one particular musician has piqued his interest over the years: Mark Twain. Mr. Risan has done extensive Twain research and acquisition work with The Twain Project in Berkeley, CA and on his own. He owns the prized 1835 Martin 2½-17 guitar which accompanied Sam Clemens on his travels in America. In 1999, Risan was interviewed about the guitar by Noah Adams on National Public Radio’s Lost And Found Sound. Risan also discovered the poem Genius unedited in Mark Twain's private journal. This fascination with the original bohemian led Risan to write a major motion picture screenplay entitled Mark Twain and the Eye of God, a story chronicling the early, raucous bohemian days of the man most people have known as a white-haired, linen-clad humorist.

Hank Risan holds Bachelor's degrees in both mathematics and biology from the University of California, Santa Cruz. He was a Phi Beta Kappa Ph.D. candidate for four years in both neurobiology and mathematics, attending UC Santa Cruz and UC Berkeley concurrently. At UC Berkeley, he was one of the first to use computer mainframes to solve theoretical mathematical and biomedical research problems, and as a graduate student at UC Santa Cruz he taught advanced mathematics. His Ph.D. dissertation was conducted at Cambridge University, England, and he attended graduate level business courses at the London School of Economics. At the age of 21, Mr. Risan received an award from the National Science Foundation, in Mathematics.

With his strong background in mathematics, Mr. Risan began development of the technology that evolved into Media Rights Technologies' patent-pending software. He is responsible for the development of all technology patents and engineering at the company, as well as forming strategic relationships, interacting with industry standards bodies, and developing general business opportunities. While launching an Internet music service, Hank encountered the gravity of music piracy wrought by the proliferation of software recording applications. Supported by advanced mathematical skills and extensive business experience, he then designed the technical solutions that solve a very large industry problem.

Bianca Soros is one of the Co-Founders of Media Rights Technologies (MRT), formerly Music Public Broadcasting (MPB), and The Museum of Musical Instruments (MoMI). Bianca has a Bachelor's degree in art history, specializing in the 19th and 20th centuries, and a graduate degree in film critical studies from UC Santa Cruz where she also studied advanced computer graphic design and production.

Ms. Soros worked for West Marine Products in the IS Department, where her work consolidating the telecommunications for their headquarters as well as 228 stores nationwide directly contributed to company profits. In addition, she worked for the CEO on an expense control task force to help save the company money in various areas of expenditure.

Ms. Soros was instrumental in orchestrating collaborative exhibitions between the MoMI and major museums such as the Smithsonian, the Museum of Modern Art New York, and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston. The Guitar Is Art explores the relationship between art and the guitar, while Dangerous Curves traces the design and evolution of the guitar from Baroque to Modern.

Bianca's work has been published in NPR, Guitar Player, Acoustic Guitar, 20th Century Guitar, Strings, Guitar Graphics, and Vintage Gallery magazines, and her photographic compositions have appeared in numerous publications, including Martin Guitars: An Illustrated Celebration of America's Premier Guitar Maker. She has worked for the FBI by providing the provenance of an unknown Renoir in 1996, which led to its recovery.

Ted Fitzgerald is a twenty-year veteran with experience in all aspects of the computer industry, starting in the 1970s building 8080-based Heathkit computers while earning his undergraduate degree in molecular biology. Later, as IT Department Head at Crystal Dynamics, he participated in the development of the first 32-bit gaming system. Before many in the industry, Mr. Fitzgerald designed and created database-driven programs to oversee and track such diverse areas as customer, business and project management for companies, including Fisher Investments and KPMG. Subsequently, he architected state-of-the-art high-volume infrastructures and software delivery systems as a Senior Programmer at ClickAgent, one of the top three Internet advertising companies, later merging with ValueClick.

Mr. Fitzgerald was instrumental in establishing the IT foundation for these well-recognized companies before assuming the role of Chief Technology Officer at Media Rights Technologies (MRT). His experience and knowledge has allowed Media Rights Technologies and BlueBeat to target key elements of the multimedia industry and develop patent-pending technology to provide content management and enablement solutions. Mr. Fitzgerald is active in the design and development of MRT's vast collection of intellectual property.

Mr. Fitzgerald earned a Bachelor's degree from California State University, Fullerton, in Cellular and Molecular Biology in 1986.

Ray Salas has over 20 years' experience in development of software solutions for industry-leading companies including Hewlett-Packard, NEC, Compression Labs, Wyse Technology, and Versatec. He was also Former Technical Committee Co-Chair of the Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (PCMCIA). Mr. Salas earned a B.A. in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.