Trade Show News & Updates

Last week marked the fifteenth time I’ve attended the always-amazing Consumer Electronics Show. With 158,000 attendees and 3,100 vendors exhibiting, it’s a trade show like no other I’ve ever seen, and “massive” doesn’t begin to describe it. In fact, this year I had a pedometer in my pocket and on the day I walked the most, I took 17,000+ steps, around nine miles. One day. Walking.
There are lots and lots of companies showing their wares in reasonably modest booths, 15×15 feet, 20×20 feet, and then there are the real consumer electronics powerhouses, companies like Samsung, Sony, Intel and Sharp, they have spaces that are larger than your local store. The Sony booth itself was 30,000 square feet and took a year to design and create.
So what was worth seeing?

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Guest piece by contributing editor Gary Moskoff…
This year, CTIA was an afterthought, a last minute decision for my buddy Conor Swanson and I, but the right one. If you haven’t attended CTIA, it’s a different kind of conference… Where else can one find a Satellite Transceiver Station on a convention floor sitting next to LG’s booth?
CTIA, in case you’re not familiar with the group, is the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunications Industry. You can find out more about the association and the conference at the Web site: ctia.org.

We enjoyed checking out a number of products during the convention, including Sprint and Google’s partnership to release Google Voice on the Sprint network, but my favorite product was…

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[This conference review is written by contributing editor Gary Moskoff]
Macworld Expo, to some a pilgrimage, came upon us yet again this February. For me, Macworld was at the right time for a variety of meetings I already had lined up, and San Francisco is always the right place, one of my favorite cities!
As I prepared for the technology wonderland of Macworld Expo, I found that it wasn?t just about the product on the Expo floor, it?s also about the educational experience, and the opportunity to immerse oneself in the root of the Mac subculture. And although I didn’?t attend half of the seminars I wanted to, the ones I did attend were interesting and definitely informative.
The keynote, given by David Pogue, was especially noteworthy. Mr. Pogue is the personal technology columnist for the New York Times, and tech correspondent for CBS News Sunday Morning, and apparently a comedian as well, because his 9am, “?Late Night with David Pogue”? session kept me chuckling all day!

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Dell just introduced a new laptop that’s getting a lot of buzz because of its inevitable comparison with the popular Macbook Air (a laptop that I used here at Ask Dave Taylor, as it happens). I’m lucky to be here at SXSW 2009 where they’re letting us play with one and got a bunch of photos of the computer adjacent to my own machine…

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Day Two of the huge Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, and we decided to check out the Central and North halls of the unimaginably massive Las Vegas Convention Center. The Central Hall seemed to be dominated by large tech companies, notably Microsoft, Intel, Motorola, and the like, along with a sprinkling of accessory manufacturers dwelling on the periphery.
The North Hall was in-car audio and mobile audio and devices, which was less well attended and, to my interests, less interesting. More amazing cars and lots of “booth babes” who were dressed exactly as they’d been for the almost cliché mechanic’s calendars they’d posed for in the first place. And lots of guys eager to pose for photos with ’em, arm firmly in place around their barely clad waists.
We took a break, then went to the Las Vegas Hilton’s own convention area for the International Gateway, which was exclusively representing companies in China and Hong Kong. Lots and lots of tiny booths with an amazing array of gadgets, gizmos and gewgaws, and every company hoping to find someone to distribute their products in the United States. This makes it a bit frustrating when you see something cool and realize that it might never be for sale through Best Buy, Wal-Mart or even Amazon.com, but it’s fascinating to think that two shy Chinese women who are hiding out in their tiny booth might well representing a two-thousand person strong manufacturing powerhouse in a far-flung province of China.
Anyway, on with the photos!

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End of day one of the Consumer Electronics Show 2009 and I barely made it through the upper and lower South Hall in the Las Vegas Convention Center before I had to split for the splendid Showstoppers evening event at the sumptuous Wynn Hotel and Casino on the Strip.
There were tons of interesting things to see and really, an amazing number of companies and people, but I tried to find both what was interesting and amusing, to give you a sense both of the new consumer electronics products that are coming out onto the market and the inane delight of a massive (135,000 attendee!) trade show.
Please read on to see my first day photo exhibit, with commentary…

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This is the first of many reports we’ll be filing from the Consumer Electronics Show, January 2009 in Las Vegas, Nevada. There are lots of places to get all the big announcements, so our focus will be on trends and things that catch our eye.
Will Interactive Blu-Ray Save the Format?
“Dreamer, a leader in interactive TV solutions, announces today that their BIDDLE™ platform will be utilized by Technicolor to offer digital content delivery services including online and disc-based direct-to-TV solutions for Blu-ray; allowing movie studios, broadcasters, record labels and other content distributors to utilize BD-Live as a fully-controllable direct marketing and e-commerce tool.”
There’s a lot that’s interesting in this announcement: First off, that Technicolor is expanding into your home, a smart move, but also that Blu-Ray Live can include e-commerce capabilities. Now we really might see a “click to buy Angelina Jolie’s t-shirt” button floating above her during key scenes in Wanted or similar.
Will that work? Is it enough to save the lackluster performance of Blu-Ray as video on demand and DVR systems become increasingly sophisticated? You tell me.

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