Dear friend:

This year's Personal Democracy Forum 2016 opened with a video tribute to former White House staffer Jake Brewer, who died tragically last fall in an accident during a charity bike ride, and a talk by his wife Mary Katharine Ham. 

Brewer, who had also worked for the Sunlight Foundation, Code for America, and Change.org, was the co-founder of Define American, and a friend to many in the civic tech community. In her presentation, Ham spoke courageously about carrying on without him, and shared his vision of America as the world's greatest start-up. By the time she was done, there was hardly a dry eye in the house.

Please feel free to share the links to those talks, using the hashtag #PDF16. And keep an eye on your in-box: we'll be posting up more PDF16 video links over the coming days and weeks.