Last week was our chance to get out from behind our computers for a while and get in front of customers by attending not one – but two back-to-back conferences in Boston.

The big event of the week was the annual convention of the American Institute of Architects (AIA). This major conference and tradeshow attracted over 15,000 architects from around the US who came to participate in continuing education and learn about the latest products and services. The theme this year was “We the People” with the focus on the responsibilities of architects to engage the public in designing for a more sustainable world. This is a theme close to our hearts and over the course of the three-day event we had the opportunity to speak with many participants about the benefits – both in productivity and sustainability – of using Cozimo for online review and collaboration. Most of the architects were extremely receptive with many expressing how they’ve been looking for exactly the type of service that Cozimo offers. For a profession as traditionally entrenched in paper as architecture, it’s an encouraging sign of progress.

In conjunction with AIA convention was VisMasters Design Modeling and Visualization Conference. This event was a far more intimate affair, attracting 350 specialists involved in design visualization for the architecture and building community. This group is ahead of the curve when it comes to using fully digital workflows and Cozimo is, in fact, already used by many of the leading firms who were present. In the more informal setting of this conference, we had a good opportunity to engage current and prospective customers in discussions regarding their needs and our priorities for future development. Kudos to Jeff Mottle and the crew at VisMasters for organizing a great event.

Last week, I had the pleasure of participating in a special Technology Day at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City. The theme of the day was the “Teaching and Learning in Four Dimensions” and focused on the impact that emerging 3D prototyping and immersive technologies are having on the world of fashion and education. The Keynote speakers were W. James Au and Janine Hawkins. James gave an engaging presentation about the principles of Second Life (SL) and how the various user groups interact. Janine is the Editor of Second Style in SL and spoke more specifically about the top designers in SL and how many talented international, especially Japanese, designers are using it to gain recognition and promote their work. I was really struck by just how quickly and profoundly the virtual and real worlds of fashion are converging in the design, commercial and educational realms. You can find an excellent summary of the day’s events on Elaine Polvinen’s Virtual Fashion Technology blog.

The event was organized (exceptionally well, I may add) by Beth Harris, a professor of art history at FIT and a leading proponent of technological innovation in education. Beth originally discovered Cozimo through the web and contacted us to learn more. Since then we’ve developed a close relationship and Beth has shared her considerable experience and passion on the needs of educators. Dealing effectively with rich media is one of her primary concerns and she immediately jumped at the opportunity to experiment with Cozimo’s new WordPress plugin on smARThistory, a blog she maintains with her colleague Steven Zucker.

Thanks to Beth’s invitation, I had the opportunity to meet educators from FIT and other institutions who attended Technology Day. We’ll be setting up full Cozimo accounts for a number of courses in the upcoming semester and we’re looking forward to supporting other educational initiatives they are working on.

This year’s VisMasters Design Modeling and Visualization Conference is being held in Boston, May 12-13, and we’re very pleased to be one of the sponsors this year. In fact, it was at DMVC two years ago that Randal Stevens and Jeff Mottle of VisMasters and CGarchitect.com generously gave us the opportunity to preview our alpha version of Cozimo to the attendees and many of our current customers go back to that event. So it will be great to get back and show everyone how far we’ve come since those early days.

DMVC is really the only conference of its kind in North America to specifically address the needs of architects, designers, artists and CG producers who are involved in 3D design visualization. It brings together some of the best speakers and instructors from around the world for two intensive days of sessions dealing with the latest technologies and techniques. Speaking from experience, it’s also a great informal event to meet and learn from a very passionate group of interesting people doing some incredible CG work. If you’re in the field, it’s well worth attending. And as sponsors we can save you $50 on the registration if you use the promo code – dmvc08cozimo – when registering. See you there!

Last week we were back in California, presenting Cozimo at Under The Radar. This is one of the better run conferences in the valley where new companies get to make their pitch in front of a panel industry experts – what Kara Swisher (a tech journalist for the Wall Street Journal) calls a “geek version of American Idol”. The theme for this event was “The Business of Web Apps”. There were 40 companies invited and we were part of the track called “Working Together”.

With only 6 minutes to present we decide to try something different this time – running the whole presentation as a live collaborative session. So in addition to image and video examples we also presented our slides within Cozimo and collaborated on them in real-time as the presentation proceeded. It did add some fun improvisation and in the end did a great job of illustrating what we’re all about. In the discussion that followed we garnered high points from the panel for the quality of our technology.

After the high pressure of DEMO, one of the nicer aspects of UTR was the more relaxed atmosphere with plenty of opportunity to mingle and speak with the VCs, journalists and other companies who attended. While it does help generate some buzz for our efforts, probably the most valuable aspect is learning about what other companies are up to, meeting the principals, and (in keeping with the theme) finding some promising opportunities to work together.

The Crunchies are a new annual competition sponsored by GigaOm, Read/WriteWeb, VentureBeat and TechCrunch to recognize and celebrate the most compelling and innovative startups of the year. There are lots of categories to choose from so we invite you to nominate Cozimo for all the ones you think describe us best (and there are so many . Nominations are open through midnight (pst) Wednesday so cast your vote here and pass the word. Thanks!