Ben Werdmuller
Senior Director Of Technology at ProPublica
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolBen Werdmuller is a seasoned technology leader with 18 years of experience building community-focused products and leading engineering teams, now serving as Senior Director of Technology at ProPublica. He blends founder instincts from co-founding projects like Elgg and Known with hands-on engineering—contributing full-stack work on notable open-source projects such as Unlock, a blockchain-based membership protocol. His background spans startup CTO roles, product leadership at Unlock Inc, and senior engineering at Medium, giving him a rare mix of product, investment, and operational perspectives. Ben is comfortable across stacks—shipping React UI improvements, back-end PHP features, and scalable platform architecture—and he prioritizes tech that amplifies civic and community value. He recently studied ethics, technology, and public policy at Stanford, signaling a commitment to responsible tech leadership. Based in Philadelphia, he is known for turning complex social requirements into pragmatic, reusable systems and UX-focused components.
18 years of coding experience
19 years of employment as a software developer
BSc (Hons) Computer Science, BSc (Hons) Computer Science at The University of EdinburghBachelor of Science Computational Science, Bachelor of Science Computational Science at University of EdinburghEthics Technology and Public Policy for Practitioners, Ethics Technology and Public Policy for Practitioners at Stanford University
Stackoverflow
185reputation
14kreached
11answers
4questions
Github Skills (24)
javascript10
back-end-development10
mysql10
component-development10
css10
php10
front-end-development10
html10
react10
user-interface9
ui-design9
interface-design9
responsive-design9
nextjs8
template-engine7
Programming languages (7)
Github contributions (5)
idno/known
Jan 2013 - Dec 2022
A social publishing platform.
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Back-end DeveloperContributions:26 releases, 44 reviews, 3168 commits in 10 years
Contributions summary:Ben appears to be focused on the back-end development of the social publishing platform, known. They contributed to the core functionality of the application through code changes in PHP files, CSS, and various other templates. The commits involved the introduction of a helper robot, a system for file uploading, a public comments section, and integration of features with external social networks like Twitter. In addition to this, the user updated the schema and database components as well.
cmscms-frameworksocial-networkpublishingphp
unlock-protocol/unlock
Aug 2018 - Oct 2022
Ʉnlock is a protocol for memberships built on a blockchain.
Role in this project:Full-stack Developer
Full-stack DeveloperContributions:259 commits, 546 PRs, 596 pushes in 4 years 2 months
Contributions summary:Ben primarily worked on front-end components using React within the `unlock-protocol/unlock` repository. Their contributions included improvements to user interface elements like the transaction modal, display of network information, and the creation of reusable components like the NetworkBadge. The developer also implemented features such as the creation of a new event page with a ticket form and also added support for ERC20 locks. They made numerous improvements to the overall styling, layout, and responsiveness of the application.
membershipsblockstackethereumprotocoljavascript
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