Basically, Handshake enables decentralized domains based on bitcoin technology.

This year’s online conference is again FREE to attend, so you have no excuse not to pop in and at least see some of the amazing sessions.

What is the agenda you ask?

I’m glad you asked. Here is the amazing rundown of speakers and sessions. This is an intense, 3-day event with speakers and panels, and hackathon discussions.

Please note - for the most up to date Schedule - check the event website at Handshake.conference on HNS or on the old DNS at Handycon.xyz.

You can RSVP free at Airmeet here.

The HandyCon event officially kicks off at 14:00 Pacific (San Francisco) time with a welcome from Jehan Chu, Managing Director at Kinetic Capital and partner in dWeb Foundation. Alongside him is Mike Michelini, blogger at SkyInclude, and also co-host, FistFull.

The first speaker is Joseph Peculiar, Blockchain Engineer, Crypto.com who will give a Handshake Primer. Curious what Handshake and the decentralized internet at large is? Joseph will share the insights and strategies you need to get up to speed on all things dWeb. By the end of his session, you’ll be able to understand the differences between the current internet and the future internet, while also being equipped for the next phase of the web.

Next up is a Project Showcase, Bob Wallet Surface. One of the core developers and contributors, Rithvik, will talk about this project and how you, as a user in Handshake, can benefit from it.

After a quick break, we will discuss Shakedex. Utilizing a protocol improvement on the HNS blockchain, Shakedex allows users to buy and sell Handshake TLD domains trustlessly (thus the “DEX”, meaning decentralized exchange). Hear the insights on how it works and why it matters.

Once the project showcases are complete, we move to a fun and interactive panel: the philosophical importance of the DWeb stack. This panel has some well-known names in the Handshake community that will share on why this tech is important, not just for business and money, but also in securing the internet and freedom in general. Current panelists include Steven McKie CEO, Amentum Capital Prashant Maurya, Spheron, John Biggs covering web3 at Techcrunch, and it will be moderated by Chjango Unchained, Director of the DWeb Foundation.

At 16:20 PST, we will have a speaker session titled “Shake up your whole life”. The speaker, Derrick, will be going through the ways to resolve HNS (Handshake) domains from the simple resolvers to the more complex nodes and configurations. By the end of this session you will be fully equipped to open Handshake websites from any computer.

Now we are getting to the timeframe of 16:50 - 17:30 PST on day 1 of March 16, 2022. We have an insightful session titled “Market Trends/Data in HNS Domains,” co-hosted by Robert Raichici, Founder of Shakestats and Colin Burke of BlockDomains/. They will be covering what many of us love: the data and trends in the HNS blockchain. How many bids, how many sales, and what is hot and what is not? Where are the future trends of naming and this protocol? By the end of this session you’ll have your head swimming with data and ideas.

We will then take a networking break and transition to a Hackathon speaker/Q&A event. During HandyCon, we’ll be wrapping up an ongoing Hackathon by Matt Zipkin, Eric Zietlow, Akash Network and Daniel Helm, Skynet Labs and in the 3-day event we will be featuring and showcasing projects that have completed the hackathon. He will be answering questions from the audience during this session.

Afterwards, a quick showcase from speaker Luke Burns, a Physics Researcher, will share about HIP 05 (Handshake Improvement Proposal number 5) and Hyperzones.

Next up, curious to learn the ins and outs of the leading desktop application for Handshake auctions and name management, Bob Wallet? Speaker Rithvik will do a Bob Wallet deep dive. Expect to learn the process of claiming names for Alex100k and other reserved names for TLD owners that was laid out in the mass adoption plan granting free names and HNS coin to leaders in the web2 space.

Also learn about the FOSS airdrop, which is essentially free money for open source developers. On top of the free benefits for those who qualify, learn how to use Bob Wallet to open and bid on HNS name auctions and maintain those names you win.

More product showcases at Handycon come at 8 p.m. PST. We will have Speaker Paul Webb, founder of Nuenet/beachfront, showcase his project to the community.

Then the final session for day 1 at 21:00 PST includes speakers Thomas Castonzo, QA Manager, HandyOSS, and Alex Smith, HandyOSS Development lead, to showcase the Handy OSS project.

Day one will wrap up at 22:00 PST with some highlights and preparing everyone for another action-packed second day starting soon (starting a bit earlier than day 1).

We kick things off a bit earlier on day 2, starting at 12 p.m. noon San Francisco time, to cover even more amazing speakers and sessions.

After the welcome speech, at 12:15 p.m. PST, we will have Drew Roesener, CEO of Media Options, a top broker and investor in the domain space back again this year. A favorite from last year’s HandyCon, Andrew will talk about trends and comparisons he is seeing in domain sales in web2, and the current domain space to what he has noticed in the web3/NFT space.

We will then move to a more interactive and fun round table and booth session where you can meet sponsors and speakers as well as others in the community.

At 14:05 PST, we are back to a product showcase showing off the amazing development the community has made. This session is being presented by Fernando Falci, founder and developer of Sinpapeles, a DNS management system for Handshake names.

Once the showcase wraps up, we go to a popular panel from 14:25 - 15:05 PST that talks about all things Handshake and Mining with both east and west represented.

Looking to use your Handshake name as an username? It is a common request and feature. Handshake names are not just domains, but also your username to the web. Eskimo, lead developer of new product HNS Chat, will talk about how you can use your TLD or SLD on Handshake names to have a e2e (end-to-end encrypted) chat with other users of Handshake.

While we have discussed a lot of developer projects, the next panel is Mar 17, 15:35 - 16:15 PST that covers Institutional adoption of HNS. How can we get more big players in the web2 space to embrace the decentralized web and Handshake in general? This is an interactive panel hosted by Jothan Frakes, the CEO of Private Label Internet Service and joining him is Tom Barret, President of Encirca Inc, Chad Edad, Leader, RealtyDAO / CONTRIB, and Michal Cyger the Founder & Lead Instructor, DNAcademy.

Once we finish up the institutional talk, we move back to developer chats. This sesion is a showcase on setting up your own HSD node by Luke Burns. Running a HSD (Handshake) node is a critical part of a decentralized project, and by hosting a node you are supporting the network, Handshake, and blockchain decentralization in general. Luke will run through the steps needed to contribute.

Another popular session from last year’s HandyCon is back. On March 17, from 16:45 - 17:25 PST is a 40-minute panel with 2 of the founders of the Handshake blockchain, JJ and Andrew Lee, CEO of Purse.The audience can bring up questions and ask for opinions about how things in the HNS blockchain community are going and what the thought process was.

Continuing the discussion, Andrew Lee will moderate a panel with Matt Zipkin and others who will discuss “Challenges to Mass Adoption”. We will see what is working and what are the current roadblocks. Browser integration, more exchanges for the HNS coin, and more will be covered from both sides of the table.

Moving right along, we have another great supporter of the Handshake ecosystem. Mike Carson, Co-Founder of Park.io & Impervious, will do a session sharing about the amazing products they have contributed to the HNS community. This includes Beacon Browser and Fingertip, as well as more insights on how to utilize these for even more ease of use in the ecosystem.

Many are curious about emerging markets, and at 9 p.m. PST, we have Sajan Nair, Founder of Agaamin Technologies sharing about the registrar they have built in the India market. Get insights on how it was set up and what it takes to build one of your own.

Let’s keep on top of the Hackathon that is developing. We will have a Q&A session to learn about even more projects and websites being built over the HandyCon event at this Hackathon.

Last but not least, on day 2 we have Kiba Gateaux, a Full-Stack Developer at Consensys, sharing about his project XNHNS (cross network HNS). Here you can learn how you can bridge your Handshake TLD to Ethereum, Polygon, and more blockchains.

We are deep into the Handshake conference now on the third day, and we kick off the last day with the HandyCon edition of the Flamingo Handshake auction. Always a popular monthly live event, this one will have ultra premium TLDs such as .s/ and .dapp/. As always, a percentage of proceeds will go to the development funds and growth of the Handshake blockchain ecosystem.

This live auction will start at 12 p.m. noon Pacific standard time (PST) on Friday March 18 with a 2-hour block open.

After the amazing auction bidding frenzy is over, we go back to the speakers and panel sessions of HandyCon. Starting at 14:00 PST, the co-hosts will welcome you to the third and final day of HandyCon and catch you up on what is on the menu for the day.

At 14:10 p.m. PST, David Vorick of Sia Decentralized Storage will share information on the integration of HNS (Handshake) and SC (Sia) storage as one needs both a domain name and a hosting solution on the decentralized internet.

Immediately following decentralized storage, we will talk about decentralized computing. Greg Osuri, founder and CEO of Akash networks will be joined by Alani Kuye, Technical Program Manager at Akash, to get the audience up to speed on the way to use decentralized computing to replace the current AWS and other centralized providers.

Up next, from 15:30 - 16:00 PST, we have a panel discussing the future of hardware and how it can be integrated to the decentralized web. Chris Gormley from Genesis Global Marketing will talk about Indigitus miner. A rep from dWeb.net will be present and we have more hardware companies getting involved now.

Back to product showcases, a community star and favorite is Andy from HNSsearch. In this 20-minute showcase, we will learn the latest on the HNS Search product as well as other tools being built under the umbrella of HNS factory.

Another long-time product in the community, 0xStephan will present the latest features and updates in Niami. What started as a scoring and rating system on Handshake has expanded to a full block explorer, portfolio tool, and more. Let’s hear what the latest developments are.

Always a popular topic and use case of Handshake is SLD sales (SLD being “domains” or second level domains). In this panel, titled “Making a business on Handshake”, we have top SLD sellers nole (@nole__tx), of .tx, John Harrison (@dotsats) of .sats, and Clay Colins of .c/ on the panel, hosted by Steve Webb, Co-Founder of Impervious and gateway.io. This will be a top attended panel where we can learn how these business owners are making passive recurring income selling SLD domains on various marketplaces.

Getting towards the end of this epic 3-day online conference on all things Handshake, we will have a speaker session from 17:40 - 18:20 PST for 30 minutes by speaker Matt Zipkin, contributor at Impervious, who will share about the Future of Handshake. We are all excited about the hopes and dreams, and Matt will share some of his perspectives on the current risks and challenges, as well as the ways to overcome it.

Sticking to the theme of the event, the final speaker session of HandyCon 2022 will be a Q&A and discussion on the Namebase acquisition by Namecheap. We will hear the future roadmap while also addressing questions from the audience. Namebase is the onramp for most of the users of Handshake. It has been a critical tool for getting many of us into blockchain in general. Let’s open up our ears and notebooks for this question and answer session.

Now that the sessions are done, we will have a day three talk from the Hackathon that is happening in parallel. What are the teams building now, what are the highlights - and what can users and attendees use now to better improve the Handshake ecosystem and experience?

We hope you are as excited as we are at this time, and the last piece of content is YOU! The last part will be opening round tables in the online event where you can host a table or join a table on topics you enjoy. Codenamed “handshake.mastermind”, we encourage anyone who wants to make some solid connections before leaving the event to find a table and make some new connections.

And that is a WRAP. What an intense 3-day online conference this will be.

If you are ready for this FREE online event all things Handshake and the decentralized internet - we want to see you there.

Go to the official event site at handshake.conference/ on Handshake or Handycon.xyz and RSVP free at our event platform Airmeet now.