Use a single entry for navigation branding:

Allow a view to override the brand (esp. for conference splash pages),
Use the app name link for the admin control panel,
use the conference short title for end user content within a conference,
fall back to the app name link.

Visually, there are two substantial changes:
(1) the conference title (or short title) serves as the brand when viewing
conference content;
(2) the short title isn't shown redundantly on the navbar and the top of the
sidebar when editing a conf.

app/views/conference/show.html.haml

@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
-= content_for :splash_logo do 
-  = link_to @conference.title, "#", :class => 'navbar-brand'
-= render :partial => "home/conference_details", :locals => {:conference => @conference}
+= content_for :brand do
+  = link_to @conference.title, conference_url(@conference.short_title), class: 'navbar-brand'
+= render :partial => "home/conference_details", :locals => {:conference => @conference}