Niccolo Raffaele Barbaro (born 1952), better known as Nick Barbaro, is an American journalist and businessman who is the co-founder of ''

The Austin Chronicle ''The Austin Chronicle'' is an alternative weekly newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demogra ...

'' and co-creator of the

South by Southwest South by Southwest (SXSW) is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and Convention (meeting), conferences organized jointly that take place in mid-March in Austin, Texas. It began in 1987 and has conti ...

(SXSW) festival. Barbaro's contributions have helped define the

Austin, Texas Austin ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Texas. It is the county seat and most populous city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and W ...

music community. He co-owns the South by Southwest festival, which he co-created with Roland Swenson,

Louis Black Louis Black is an American journalist and businessman who is the co-founder of ''The Austin Chronicle'', an alternative weekly newspaper published in Austin, Texas, and was the newspaper's editor from its inception until his retirement on Augus ...

and Louis Jay Meyers in 1987. He was also the publisher of ''The Austin Chronicle'', an alternative weekly newspaper, which he founded in 1981 with

. In March 2025, Barbaro retired after 46 years and named Cassidy Frazier as the new publisher. Barbaro will remain as president of the Austin Chronicle Corporation.

Biography

Barbaro is the son of

Marilyn Buferd Marilyn Buferd (January 30, 1925 – March 27, 1990) was an American film and television actress as well as the winner of both the Miss California and Miss America pageants of 1946. During the latter half of the 1940s and throughout the 1950s, s ...

(

Miss America 1946 Miss America is an annual competition that is open to women from the United States between the ages of 18 and 28. Originating in 1921 as a "bathing beauty revue", the contest is judged on competition segments with scoring percentages: ''Priva ...

) and Francesco Barbaro, a WWII Italian submarine commander, movie agent and producer. Barbaro grew up in Los Angeles and also Dallas. He attended UCLA where he developed his interest in cinema. In the mid-1970s he moved to Austin and enrolled in the

University of Texas The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 students as of fall 2 ...

. There he earned a graduate degree in Radio, Television, and Film. While at UT he worked on ''

The Daily Texan ''The Daily Texan'' is the student newspaper of the University of Texas at Austin. It is one of the largest college newspapers in the United States, with a daily circulation of roughly 12,000 during the fall and spring semesters, and is among th ...

'' where he served as film critic. He lives in Austin with his wife Susan Moffat.

References

1952 births Living people University of Texas at Austin alumni {{Texas-bio-stub