Jan 30, 2007

railsconfau.com validity questioned

Update Thu 26 Apr 2007
The website went down a while ago. Draw your own conclusions...

Update Wed 31 Jan 2007
The site now has a new logo.
The main sponsor "HeraHelios" now has it's first result in google. This page!

Update Tue 30 Jan 2007
The site was updated to say tickets will be on sale in late Feb.
The person behind the site wrote that it was a miscommunication within the company. What company and how many staff they have has is not known.


A website appeared two days ago announcing that tickets are on sale for a rails conference in Sydney this May. It looks like a total scam and the worst bit is they are

accepting payment for registrations!

  • The advertised sponsor 'HeraHelios' doesn't turn up any results in Google.
  • There are no speakers listed (in fact the site calls for speakers).
  • They state they do not have a venue secured.
Yet the site suggests "Be sure to register soon as capacity is strictly limited."

It seems the organizers are not known to either Melbourne or Sydney's Rails user groups.

So railsconfau has many of the appearances of a scam. A scamming scam scam. Hope google picks up on this post. scam.

to look at the site, go to www . railsconfau . com

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Yep, Google has picked up this post

Paul Annesley said...

Yes, in fact this article is currently the ONLY Google result for "HeraHelios"!

I got an email about the conference, but I don't know where they sourced the addresses..

My first look at the site got alarm bells ringing in my head. I haven't found any other information about the event or its organisers.

Paul Annesley said...

I received confirmation from David Heinemeier Hansson that this event is in fact legitimate, and not a scam.

I've corrected my post about it here: http://paul.annesley.cc/articles/2007/02/01/australia-on-rails-herahelios-looks-like-a-scam