NERDS AND GEEKS WANTED!

Exabytes is running a high quality ASP.NET website building competition (that both works and looks fantastic!) and we are looking for some heroes in the making! We seek to encourage and motivate future talent in this area, so if you got what it takes to build a website or if you are even slightly geeky, we want you to join this competition! Come on now! Get that skills out of you (we know you have it somewhere), show the world what you can do, and the best part is, get awarded for it!

First Prize x 1
$500 Cash (via PayPal) + 1 Year EBiz Gold Windows Hosting Plan – $115.80

Second Prize x 1
$250 Cash (via PayPal) + 1 Year EBiz Gold Windows Hosting Plan – $115.80

Consolation Prizes x 3
1 Year EBiz Gold Windows Hosting Plan – $115.80

Who would have thought that I would spend my Valentine’s Day in Japan? It wasn’t all that bad, just that I missed my loved ones dearly.

It was an unforgettable experience as I was invited as one of the speakers of Hosting-Pro 2008 (Japan) which was held in Akihabara Convention Center, Tokyo, Japan.

Me, being the non-Japanese guy was assigned to this topic – “Oversea Hosting Industry Trends: Non-Japanese Asian hosting industry”. Needless to say, I met some great guys and one of them was the co-ordinator, Kentaro Iemoto-san (President and CEO of Clara Online Inc) and guest speaker, Kazutaka Michiyama-san (Director of Shanghai Bohan IT Inc, a sub division of Sakura Internet Technology Co. Ltd.). Weeks before I arrived Tokyo, I had conducted some researches and analyses regarding the differences between Japanese and Malaysian hosting industry.

To my surprise, most of the researches’ outcomes looked appealing and it gave me this “Wow!” feeling. The findings on the size of Malaysia’s hosting industry, the average hosting packages, the popular hosting plans, the rates of shared hosting and dedicated servers as well as the wages to hire a server engineer showed a substantial difference.

Kentaro Iemoto-san shared his views and experience of Clara Online Inc. about their expansion from Japan to Singapore and Taiwan as well as the hosting trends in Japan. Kazutaka Michiyama-san talked about how Sakura Internet Technology Co., Ltd. ventured into China and the experience in their past 2 years of operations in China.

Now, back to Malaysia, enjoying my Malaysians’ which I missed very much, I feel that it was an honour to be a part of this illustrious gathering as Hosting-Pro is one of the greatest events for Japan Hosting industry and Japanese Web Hosts. This year, it is the 5th year that Hosting-Pro is held. Every year, Hosting-Pro attracts thousands of industry visitors to participate in exhibition and conferences.

I have one great thing to share with you, my readers! You can find the information from my Hosting-Pro 2008 presentation slides which can be downloaded by clicking here:

My Presentation Slides

And of course, don’t miss out the following snap shots that I took in Japan!

All of us exchanging views…

And my new great buddy…Kazutaka Michiyama-san

Til you hear from me again, here’s me wishing all of you, Happy Hosting!

-Chan of Exabytes-