Matt Denny
Director of Marketing & Outreach at TestifySec
Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States
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Matt “Mohawk” Denny is a Marine veteran, neurodivergent brand builder, marketer, and community connector passionate about amplifying diverse voices in open source. As the CNCF Marketing Committee Co-Chair and advocate for non-coding contributors, he helps projects like in-toto and Witness thrive through creative outreach, webinars, and mentorship. Matt’s mission is to show everyone they have a place in open source, no code required.
Area of Expertise
Topics
Storytelling for Open Source Projects: Amplify Adoption, Messaging, and Community
Great open-source projects don’t succeed on code alone—they need stories that inspire adoption, contributions, and community engagement. Yet, many project leads and contributors struggle to communicate their project’s value in a way that resonates beyond technical audiences.
In this panel, Matt “Mohawk” Denny, Lorena Martinez Cure, and Miranda Carter share their unique approaches to using storytelling to amplify project visibility and impact. Matt brings expertise in building community-driven narratives that grow adoption and strengthen ecosystems. Lorena offers her perspective as a marketing strategist, simplifying complex concepts into compelling, user-focused stories. Miranda provides insights from her work as a Head of Community, bridging technical teams and broader audiences to create cohesive messaging.
Attendees will leave equipped with actionable strategies to craft stories that resonate, connect with diverse audiences, and drive long-term growth for their projects.
Misfits to Makers: How Diverse Non-Coding Contributions Power Open Source
Open source thrives on diversity—not just of people, but of skills and perspectives. Yet, many feel like outsiders in this technical world because they don’t write code. Matt Denny, a non-coding community builder, and Jay Jackson, a software developer, share how diverse collaboration bridges gaps between technical and non-technical contributors, strengthening open-source projects and the CNCF ecosystem.
This session explores why contributions beyond code—like marketing, communication, design, copy editing, mentorship and more—are essential to open source. Hear Jay’s perspective on how non-coding contributors amplify technical work, alongside his contributions to the DHHWG and projects like ImageSharp. Matt shares stories of scaling CNCF projects like in-toto, Witness, and Archivista through outreach.
Attendees will gain actionable tips for fostering collaboration, breaking silos between "misfits" and "makers," and embracing diversity to unlock untapped potential in their projects.
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