Personnel
Christopher Norris
Christopher Norris is a UK-based media executive with 30 years’ experience of working in book publishing, television, digital media, music, fashion and film.
Christopher is the Founder and Director of Jolabokaflod CIC and its sister company, Jolabokaflod Book Campaign Ltd. He also owns and runs CopyGhosting Publishing Services, a freelance vehicle for editorial, writing and digital marketing projects, serves as Director of Crowdfunding at CrowdPatch, the crowdfunding platform for social entrepreneurs, and acts as Editor and Development Executive for the Insight Film Festival: an international exhibition, awards programme and events organisation (HQ in Manchester, England) that encourages filmmakers to engage with the broad theme of ‘faith’. He hosts and manages the active Meetup group, The Wisdom of Coffee, which meets every Monday morning in central London to discuss members’ ideas, dreams, projects and businesses informally over a hot cuppa.
Jolabokaflod CIC is an early adopter and champion of the blockchain platform for smart contracts launched by the Smart Startup Company, which is engaged in attracting equity investment.
Christopher helped to pioneer and establish World Book Day in the UK book trade; he served on the steering committee for the inaugural event in 1996-7. He also worked as Consultant Producer and Writer for the mid-1990s ITV book series, You’re Booked!, and served as Research Director of StoryCode, a web 2.0 recommendation engine for fiction readers, which launched at the London Book Fair in March 2005 and featured on the BBC TV show, Dragon’s Den, in September 2006.
Liza van der Smissen
Liza van der Smissen is a multi-talented creative with a commercial focus. When she is not planning, managing and hosting exclusive events at prestigious venues in London (including Hotel Café Royal, Kensington Palace and Guildhall) she is following her parallel career as an established actress. Liza is Project Manager at Jolabokaflod CIC
Liza has worked in feature films filming internationally (Netherlands, Germany, Spain and India). She starred in the shorts A Final Truth (2017) and Neext! (2019), presented a travel series for The Telegraph Media Group, and worked on a commercial for The Royal Opera House. She has also performed in plays at Tristan Bates Theatre and Barons Court Theatre.
For further details about Liza’s professional acting career, visit her website: Liza van der Smissen.
Anthony Keates
Anthony Keates is Head of Marketing at Jolabokaflod CIC in a freelance capacity. Anthony is Founder and Director of ThinkBigBooks, a boutique marketing, publicity and digital consultancy service for the book, arts, charity, drinks and retail industries.
Anthony has decades of experience in the UK book trade (bookselling and publishing), with in-house career highlights being Marketing and Publicity Director for The Orion Publishing Group and Sales, Marketing and Publicity Director for The Watts Publishing Group (now rebranded as Hachette Children’s Group).
Project leaders, volunteers and advocates
Crowdfunding opportunities
Jolabokaflod CIC is a grassroots, interactive venture that invites people with good ideas to encourage the buying, giving and reading of books to run crowdfunding projects to build a love of books and reading in local communities around the world. The first crowdfunding project run by Jolabokaflod CIC – The Icelanders Cometh – served the dual purpose of raising money for a good cause and showcasing an example of how to run an successful crowdfunding project.
Jolabokaflod CIC also actively supports and fosters volunteers who wish to share their skills, talents, experience and contacts with specific projects, to help them to reach their target figures before their deadline dates.
Project leaders and volunteers can be considered to be members of Jolabokaflod CIC’s extended family, as can everyone who contributes funds in exchange for rewards and everyone who shares news about a Jolabokaflod CIC crowdfunding project via social media.
Friends and followers
Jolabokaflod CIC also welcomes friends and followers on social media into the fold, including people connected to our active online presences via Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram.
We publish a monthly newsletter that shares news, views, events and opportunities with subscribers (register your details here to receive the newsletter).
Websites
Jolabokaflod CIC manages two websites.
Jolabokaflod.org hosts Book Bulletin catalogues and publishes news and features about active crowdfunding projects incubated by the Jolabokaflod CIC patch at CrowdPatch. This website is also a hub for information about the Icelandic tradition of Jólabókaflóðið, a source to find out more about the country’s rich literary and cultural history, a showcase for Icelandic authors published in English and a collage of news about book promotion and reading campaigns around the world.
Jolabokaflod.com is a forthcoming platform that will host future commercial activity (run by sister company Jolabokaflod Book Campaign Ltd), such as publishing, events, sponsorship and commercial partnerships.
Jolabokaflod 