Dern @ CES 2008 Report #1 - Consume Electronics! In Vegas!

The first of several posts of stuff as I see it. After the show's over, I'll sort out my notes, brood, and post together categorized summaries, e.g. storage, mobile, photo, power..., and also my "Dern Good Stuff 'Best of CES 2008'" picks. (Plus I'll go back and add in more URLs.)

Coffee & B-Roll -- It's CES and it's Vegas, Jack

CES, the Consumer Electronics Association's annual International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) held in Las Vegas, in early January, is, according to CEA, "the world's largest consumer technology trade show, and North America's largest annual trade show of any kind." CES isn't for consumers, any more than Comdex was for end users (although some show up); it's for the retailers, manufacturers, installers, engineers, corporate buyers -- plus media folks (that's me), industry analysts, and sundry others.

Over 140,000 attendees, from 140 countries, are expected this year, to see a subset of the 2,700+ exhibitors, and perhaps catch some of the keynote speeches (including Bill Gates) and other sessions. That's Comdex-class city congestion, especially since CES's exhibits are too much to fit in either of the Vegas' two convention centers. So CES (like some of the last Comdexes) is distributed between the Las Vegas Convention Center including the Las Vegas Hilton and the parking lot in front, and, a few miles away, the interconnected Sands Expo & Convention Center and the Venetian Hotel... plus sundry related meetings and events all over town.

That's still not as big as the annual CeBIT show in Germany (I went to CeBIT in 2005, once was enough, thank you), where people often commute/travel in daily from one or two countries away. But it's plenty big. Big enough -- plus, given Vegas's sprawling, make-you-walk-past-as-many-shops-and-other-spending-things-as-possible architecture -- that we spend a lot of time walking, waiting in lines, taking taxis, shuttles and busses (the monorail here is five bucks a ride, doesn't go to or stop near a lot of places, and may be public transit but isn't "mass" transit by any stretch of the imagination). And although the city overall has, over the past five or ten years, gone non-smoking in restaurants, lobbies and many other places, the casino/gaming areas are still smokey, and it spills over.

I.e., if you think I or others are here having fun, think twice. Yeah, we're having some fun, and seeing colleagues who we're friends with. But attending this show is tiring, grueling work. And so far, it's grey and chilly here. We'd all rather be home or at the office.

Like the name suggests, CES is primarily about consumer electronics, including entertainment and other widgits for your house, car, and boat, as well as for mobile (walk, bicycle, travel) consumers, wireless, video (lots of HDTV!), gaming, content, high-end audio and some professional/business stuff. Plus odd-lot stuff like home security, electric toothbrushes, and -- well, we'll see. (For what it's worth, according to one person I chatted with at Logan Airport while waiting for our flight, CES is no longer the premier show for home audio/theater, CEDIA is.) Products that have debuted at past CES shows include the VCR (1970), the laserdisk player (1974) (I still own one :-), CD player (1981), DVD (1996), HDTV (1998), Xbox (2001), and plasma TV (2001).

There is, however, a lot of "prosumer" (professional consumer), business and office technology on display -- not surprising, given that a lot of today's tech can serve both groups. What there isn't much of (so far) is IT in the classic sense -- technology for companies also concerned with managing things and integrating them into their computing and network environments. I saw some IT-oriented exhibitors so far, at the Storage Visions Expo, like the Trusted Computing Group, and backup arrays and services, but I expect these will be in the minority.

Sensibly and fortunately, exhibitors are grouped by type into halls, as much as possible, e.g. automotive in one, home stuff in another. Some people might never leave a given hall; I could easily not go to half the halls, and not miss too much (although there's always something quirky or otherwise interesting there).

Once again, I'm sending myself, on my own kilo-dollar. With the Comdex and PC Expo shows no longer around, CES, including the associated press events, is the closest thing there is to a general computer show with professional/business and borderline-IT stuff. My main goals -- although, of course I'd be happy to sell some soon-after coverage -- are research and networking -- to see interesting stuff to write about, and schmooze with editors and reporters and PR folks to write for over the ear to come.

The CES show floor doesn't open until Monday morning, January 7. But things started early Saturday morning, with, among other things, Storage Visions 2008. And although Sunday is "Press Day," at least one CES partner event, Storage Visions, runs all day Saturday and Sunday with sessions and a few dozen exhibitor tables, and 4PM Saturday is "CES Unveiled," CES's press kick-off event with several dozen exhibitors.

Sunday morning is PRmeister Marty Winston's Cherry Picks event for the press, where press sits in chairs while vendors come up on stage one by one and do a one-minute overview spiel about their product (which has to be new since July 1). Sunday evening is Pepcom's Digital Experience, the first big press-and-analyst-place-to-be multi-vendor event -- scores of vendor tables, plus food and schmoozing.

Monday and Tuesday there's Pat Meier-Johnson's Lunch@Pieros, where invited journalists can get a decent lunch and chat with a dozen or two vendors inside Piero's Restaurant, an easy one-block walk from the Las Vegas Convention Center... and Monday night, ShowStoppers, the other big evening multi-vendor press see-schmooze-and-eat event.

Plus daytime strolling the exhibits at the show floors, of course, traffic and crowds permitting.