The PAN Arab Awards has started taking entries for its upcoming scam competition. This is the original source of our Oman Web Awards scam that was held last September. The PAN Arab Awards is nothing but a bigger Oman Web Awards joke, each contestant is obliged to pay a non-refundable $100 entry fee for a chance to win a wooden award at a ceremony to be held at a yet-to-be-announced date in Jordan. If you apply for a category that does not get another two submissions that category and your application will be scrapped and you will not get a refund.
The competition has started but there is not date at which the ceremony would be held. You are supposed to book your flight and hotel stay on your own without knowing when the ceremony is to be held. (You’re paying for all these yourself) I cannot believe they did not say whether the people that did not win would be told if they won or not and could be expected to travel all the way to Jordan to be told that they did not win.
Winning at the PAN Arab Awards does not reward you with anything. Barely anybody knows about the event, I do not expect proper TV coverage (IF ANY AT ALL), the 2005 winners page at the PAN Arab Awards website has A ZERO Google ranking meaning that it cannot even enhance the page rankings of winners. There is no monetary award or anything.
Winning at the PAN Arab Awards does mean that your website is actually any good, all the suggested criteria do not have any impact on the results. Last year, the winner website in the personal websites category was the website of the King of Jordan, the running-up was his brother’s website. In case you didn’t get this last point, the competition was held in Jordan.
The people at the Oman Web Awards lied, whether you won at the Oman Web Awards or not does not affect your eligibility to enter the PAN Arab Awards, anyone can still enter the PAN Arab Awards, and you will still have to pay your $100 entry fee whether you won or not.
I do not know what happened to the UAE Web Awards, their website does not have a winners’ page, it is unknown whether the competition was completed or not.
I would like to warn all sponsors not to endorse such a scam that does not contribute to our electronic culture and does not benefit webmasters, web designers, nor web entrepreneurs. A mere celebration at a fancy hotel with no real prizes cannot logically be worth all the money you paid and the money of all the contestants. This whole event is a fraudulent scam that has been stealing the money of individuals and companies in the name of web design competition. You do not have to be their next victim.