The Cloudfest USA team is hard at work, having just released the preliminary agenda and we hope you are as excited as we are for 2.5 days of fantastic content, networking and parties. While you giddily await more rollouts over the next few months, we’re back with our third Q&A, an interview with Aaron Campbell, Director of Products at A2 Hosting, as well as a member of the CloudFest USA Advisory Board.
Come read why Aaron Campbell is so excited for CloudFest USA’s new home, which pioneer of the Scientific Revolution Aaron would interview if he had a time machine and hear about his eclectic hat collection!
Editor’s Note: This Q&A has been edited for length and clarity
Earlier this year, World Host Group acquired A2 Hosting. How will this impact the services and solutions that you can provide for your clients?
A: The short answer is – things are only getting better! For all current customers, their hosting plans, logins and features will remain unchanged. However, the acquisition is allowing us to expand our offerings to at least ten new points of presence in countries we’d not previously been able to offer. Our support team has expanded, which will shorten wait times and our roadmap of exciting new features is moving faster and customers will be able to enjoy it sooner!
As a repeat CloudFest USA panelist, what topic or topic ideas are most front of mind for you in 2025?
A: The thing I spend the most time thinking about is how expectations of internet users – both consumers and creators – have been changing. Consumers expect a speed of delivery and a conciseness of information that we would never have imagined even five years ago. Creators want a central place that offers a solution that can take them from start to success, without needing to understand the stack it’s built on, the version they’re using or how all the moving pieces function.
These changes in expectations are driving the industry changes that we’re seeing as hosts move from offering services – server space in a data center – to products and solutions that facilitate customer success. Now, we’ve reached an inflection point where we’re seeing the biggest successes in our space change from companies building their offerings from the tech up to instead creating from the user experience down.
What are you most looking forward to about CloudFest USA 2025 and its move to Miami?
A: CloudFest Europe has been a huge success, bringing together top companies and key industry leaders to Rust every year. Now it’s time for CloudFest USA to create the same momentum for North America. Miami is the perfect place to facilitate this: fun, easy to get to, and built for making things happen!
If you could program your own fireside chat with one person currently working in the industry, who would it be and why?
A: It would be amazing to chat with Tim Berners-Lee in the context of the modern web. As the inventor of HTML, HTTP, URL, and more, I would love to talk to him about what he envisioned the web being when he started and what he thinks about what it has become.
If you could program your own fireside chat with any person, dead or alive, who isn’t currently in the industry, who would it be and why?
A: Without a doubt, Isaac Newton. Obviously, I’m fascinated by all the groundwork he laid for the creation of the modern world and tech – from Newtonian Mechanics to Calculus – but maybe most of all by his take on how he got there. “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” I’d love to hear from him how the spread of information in his time allowed him to accomplish all that he did, and show him how the internet has completely revolutionized how information is shared today.
You’re well-known in the industry for your many hats. How many do you own and do you have a favorite?
A: I have about a dozen or so, including some fun ones that are rainbow colored, glittery, or even that have flashing LEDs. My favorite? Well, I love a good purple, and I have an amazing felt trilby hat that is a deep purple, almost aubergine, color. It might be a bit warm for normal wear around Miami, but you’re likely to see me in it at least one day at CloudFest USA! (And if you do – stop me and say hi!)
Join CloudFest USA in Miami
November 5-6, 2025
