Conferences attended in 2010

Since our last newsletter AWS staff have attended numerous conferences: DrupalCon in Copenhagen, DomainSpain in Valencia, Web Congress in Malaga, Business Constituency in Washington and ICANN in Cartagena.

William Eaton, our head of Technical, attended DrupalCon in Copenhagen in August (read more). Drupalcon, which takes place two or three times a year, is the meeting of those interested in all levels of the Drupal content management system. DrupalCon is excellent for every level of manager and programmer, as there are a variety of channels available to suit your interests and expertise.

In September two of our directors, Michelle and Chris Chaplow attended Domaining Spain III in Valencia. This is the premier event in the Iberian peninsula for ‘Domainers', or those interested in investing or buying and selling domains. It is astonishing how fast this industry is growing, and we attended to try and get a better understanding of the industry. A number of excellent workshops covered all aspects of domains from SEO to direct traffic. The event was sponsored by SEDO, the world's leading domain marketplace, and its founder and CEO Tim Schumacher presented a paper comparing domains to stock valuation procedures. SEDO's mission is to be a source for all domain names, both unregistered and in the aftermarket (second-hand). The star guests were the legendary Castillo brothers who run PalmSprings.com and 2000 other websites. Their advice for success is to put content on your domain and not just pay-per-click adverts. On the final day of the conference the delegates were treated to a boat trip in the El Palmar National Park, and a giant Valencian paella in a restaurant in the village.

Also in September general manager Noemi Roman presented a paper entitled "Domain Names in Marketing' at the Web Congress in Malaga. Her presentation outlined the different uses of domain names for SEO and direct traffic generation. It argued that domains should now be considered an investment, rather than a cost. The Congress, which was held at the Malaga Palacio de Congresos, was an industry event aimed at those interested in internet marketing, covering all areas from SEO to social media. "Every business should have a community manager," declared one of the delegates.

The Business Constituency of ICANN, to which Andalucia.com belongs, held its first face-to-face meeting outside the tri-annual ICANN meetings in Washington DC on 12 October. Chris Chaplow attended, as Vice Chair of the BC for Finance and Operations. Two interesting round tables were presented in the morning, one of which was on "Security, Stability and Resilience of the Internet". This is something that the business community tends to take for granted. There are issues that affect companies both large and small, and BC's aim is to campaign in its policy-making role on behalf of business. The other topic was "Dot Brand": this is the name given to a new type of generic top-level domain (Gtld), just like cities, governments, entrepreneurs and investors. Unlike the other groups, very few global brands have declared their positions; notable exceptions include .Canon and .Deloite. A few have expressed indecision, such as .bbc or .nestle. Is this a strategy to keep competitors guessing? I tend to think not. Internet lawyer Kristina Rosette declared that there is only one certainty: ‘No one person in a company wants to make the yes/no decision alone.'

The final conference of this year was the ICANN meeting in Cartagena de las Indias in Colombia. in December, where Chris Chaplow presented proudly presented the new design website to AWS client ICANN.

Andalucia Web Solutions prides itself on keeping our team constantly up to date with advances in Internet Technology, so that we as a professional web development company, can pass on this invaluable knowledge to our clients.