Hot domain names driving traffic on the Web to Southwest Virginia businesses
22.05.12
Make room, Silicon Valley.
On this, the 15-year anniversary of the Web as a tool for everyday use, the tech community of the Roanoke-Blacksburg region can revel about a little dot-com notoriety. A few of the finest Web domain names now in use belong not to groups and companies in a big city, but to organizations here.
There's greenways.org, registered to Roanoke Valley Greenways. Microsope.com pings back to Roanoke. Dna.com's current home is Blacksburg.
As the history of the Web is written, Switzerland (where the Web was invented) and California (home to Google) will figure big. But let's not overlook Southwest Virginia, whose economy is tilting slightly from manufacturing toward Web-based businesses.
"It seems like in this region we did get an early jump on the importance of the Web," said Gordie Zeigler, who directed the Roanoke-Blacksburg Technology Council - then called the New Century Technology Council - beginning in 2001. He is an account manager at the Roanoke office of SyCom Technologies, a network integration firm.
Source: Roanoke Times