About Bookswim

Bios

Who Are We?

College friends, George Burke and Shamoon Siddiqui, founded BookSwim in 2006 because they shared both a love for reading and a desire not to spend so much money on it. Prior to going online, BookSwim earned the Rutgers Business School's 2006-2007 Business Plan Competition Finalist Award. Since launching the subscription service, BookSwim has grown rapidly, breaking all one-year projections in under six months, and tripling by the end of that first year. Burke and Siddiqui brought an improved version of BookSwim, already in business, back to the Rutgers competition for the 2007-2008 edition, and won the grand prize.

Management Team

Acting Chief Executive Officer

With an executive career in the Direct Marketing book industry that goes back over 25 years, Georg Richter brings tremendous experience to the BookSwim team. He has held an array of President and COO positions at companies including YESSolutions, Bookspan, BMG Direct, Scholastic At Home, Doubleday Select and Bantam, Doubleday Dell Publishing.

The wealth of knowledge that Richter contributes to this fledgling company is helping, day-by-day, to turn BookSwim into a more organized, more efficient and more profitable company, while providing a constantly improving service.

Georg holds an MBA and DBA from Vienna University of Economics & Business Administration, as well as a PhD in Communications Sciences from the University of Vienna. He is also the most handsome hobby-lumberjack the East Coast has ever known and his favorite book is Stephen King's The Stand.

CIO/CTO

An internet Entrepreneur since the tender age of 14, Nick Ruffilo, Chief Information Officer and resident wunderkind, is the driving force behind what keeps BookSwim functional on a day-to-day basis. Having joined the team within mere months BookSwim's current 2.0 release, he has been hard at work ever since, improving the functionality of the website and service while tirelessly developing what will eventually be dubbed BookSwim 3.0.

Ruffilo has formerly run such websites as the video game-focused CheatWorld Online and entertainment-based network 'The Boredom Network', as well as running a web development consultancy practice. Ruffilo is co-author and founder of the webcomic/comic book 'Amazing Super Zeroes.

Nick attended the Academy for Business and Computer Technology and received a BS in Business and Technology from Stevens Institute of Technology. He was also TIME Magazine's person of the year in 2006 and gives excellent back/neck massages. His favorite book is Jorges Borges' Labyrinth.

VP of Marketing

In 2003, Eric Ginsberg, an avid musician and songwriter, founded a music education-focused non-profit in his native NJ. Not knowing how else to spread the word, he started calling local newspapers, magazines and radio stations, unwittingly beginning a media relations and marketing career.

Though a Math Education major working full-time as a teacher, Ginsberg took the advice of a local Editor in Chief and pursued a PR job at the largest independent library system in the state. The time he spent there gave Eric great insight into the habits and activities of readers and into the non-profit book-lending world.

Ginsberg brought his library experience to BookSwim just months after its launch, helping shape BookSwim into the well-rounded company it has become. Eric is considered to be "the voice of BookSwim," responsible for online copy as well as presenting BookSwim's unique message to the media and at conferences around the country. When not at work, Eric can be found performing at local rock clubs, jamming out, rocking on, honking on bobo, or whatever it is those musicians do.

His favorite book is Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which he has read cover-to-cover three times.

Founders

Co-Founder, Chairman, Chief Marketing Officer

George got his start as lead web designer for the Aviation Department of the Port Authority of NY & NJ, charged with the maintenance of websites for John F. Kennedy Int'l Airport, LaGuardia Airport and Newark Liberty Int'l Airport. In addition to developing websites for Teterboro Airport and Downtown Manhattan Heliport, George developed and maintained the P.A.'s Air Cargo website. You can thank him for that time your luggage didn't end up on the other side of the country.

He later utilized his web experience as the Director of Internet Marketing for online graphic design school, Sessions.edu. There, George developed his passion for search engine optimization, managing advertising accounts and developing new market initiatives.

Before co-founding BookSwim, George started the new media design company, Circular Orb, LLC, becoming a leader in the growing market of Artisan e-commerce. Under Circular Orb, he personally managed projects for over 40 of clients before selling the company in 2006.

George holds a BS in Information Technology, and a Minor in Management from New Jersey Institute of Technology, where he spent many an evening reading at his local bookstore due to the utterly inequitable lack of girls on campus. Also, though you wouldn't notice it until someone mentions it, his legs are ever so slightly disproportionately long for his torso. His favorite book is the Aldous Huxley classic, Brave New World, in which, ironically enough, good books are banned. He is longing for the day he can pick up his guitar and microphone again.

Co-Founder

In the summer of 2003, while attending New Jersey Institute of Technology, Shamoon found himself at UCF, Orlando, FL, experimenting with nanotechnology for the conceptual Space Elevator project. Upon completing his BS in Computer Engineering, with a specialization in Computer Communication Systems, Shamoon traveled to the University of North Dakota, where he spent the summer working on the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle project for the National Science Foundation.

Soon, Shamoon caught wind of the DARPA Grand Challenge, an open call to scientists across the country to create an autonomous car. Returning to NJIT to pursue his MS in Computer Engineering, specializing in Intelligent Systems, he founded Highlander Racing, a team of 25 students, with the singular goal of winning the DARPA Grand Challenge: build a car that can drive 140 desert miles by itself.

After receiving his MS, Shamoon delved into software and technology for government contractors, ITT Avionics and BAE Systems. Shamoon recently completed his M.B.A. at Rutgers University, with dual specializations in Global Business and Management.

Since leaving BookSwim, Shamoon has moved on to several other exciting ventures, including his latest creation, PriceDrip.com. He enjoys candlelit dinners and long walks on the beach, and his favorite book is Atlas Shrugged.