Basically, the annual trade show for the computer industry rose from the dead during the week of November 17 and gave the world another Fall Comdex in Las Vegas. Except that it was literally a shadow of its former self. Having peaked in the year 2000 with 2,337 exhibitors and more than 200,000 visitors, the number of exhibitors fell painfully to 1,685 in 2001. Part of that decline would be blamed on fear of traveling after the 9/11 attacks, but the number of exhibitors fell further in 2002, to about 1,100.
While that number still made Comdex twice the size of the average American industrial trade show, it was enough to push its sponsor, Key3media Inc., into bankruptcy. It emerged from bankruptcy in June with a new name, MediaLive International. No exhibit space could be sold until the bankruptcy was settled, so, essentially, the show was thrown together in five months.
The result was trade show with 550 exhibitors that seemed to run astonishingly smoothly. One Asian exhibit manager told me that, in 25 years of managing trips to trade shows, this was the first time that not a single one of his clients was complaining about anything. It took up only the main hall in the Las Vegas Convention Center, leaving the other halls dark and empty. The 2000 show had consumed the entire huge facility, as well as the large Sands Convention Center across town and many casino-hotels. The show had about 50,000 exhibitors, and the floor was more crowded than it had appeared in years. However, the crowded appearance was also a manufactured illusion, at least in part, thanks to the narrow aisles.
Lines of cabs were waiting for people, instead of the other way around. The streets around the convention center were not hopelessly congested. You could actually get around the city - in previous years, desperate, stranded people often ended up hiking over to the Las Vegas Strip in hopes of finding a stray bus or cab that could get them to the airport on time.
Inside, about a third of the exhibitors were from Asia, and overall about half the exhibits were from outside the U.S. Microsoft had its usual huge booth. Dell had a booth, after being absent from Comdex for about six years. Big names that made it to the show included Acer, AT&T Wireless, CMP, Fujitsu, Gateway, Google, Hewlett-Packard, MCI, National Semiconductor, NEC, Palm, Sharp, Siebel, Sprint, ViewSonic, and (for some reason) the U.S. Postal Service. As usual, IBM and Apple stayed away. IBM did hold a large off-site party, part of a trend involving participation without buying a booth that Comdex' organizers are bitter about.
Noticeably absent were the booths that showed crystal globes, luggage, refrigerator magnets, vibrating chairs, and the like (although those chairs were sorely missed.) Comdex management announced that non-industry exhibitors were not invited, due to a new 'business to business' emphasis. They also announced that they would here-after pay more attention to the customers, although they gave no examples of the previous management's deafness. Another new wrinkle was space on the floor where hardware could be sold. Previously, sales on the show floor were not allowed - but, of course you could close deals.
There was some excitement among the show-goers about one vendor selling full-featured digital cameras at a surprisingly low price - but the user interface was in Korean. For the first time, Comdex also sponsored a series of purely social parties at various casinos. Tickets to these 'After Dark' events actually sold out.
The show kicked off - as it has since 1983 - with a keynote address from billionaire Microsoft founder Bill Gates. He actually talked nostalgically about his 1983 speech, recalling how his father had run the slide projector, and how the undo command had been a big thing then.
The highlight of his 2003 presentation was a video that spoofed 'The Matrix' motion picture, with Gates in the part of Morpheus and fellow Microsoft billionaire Steve Balmer as Neo. Balmer/Neo is interrogated by evil agents, but escapes when their laptop encounters a Linux kernel error. After some kung fu scenes, Gates/Morpheus offers him a choice of either the blue pill (too large to swallow, and covered with IBM and Linux logos) and the opportunity to go back to a world over-run with expensive consultants, or the red pill (small, with a Windows logo) which will allow him to wake up in a world where users presumably manage their own computers.
Gates and McNealy talking
Getting back to business, Gates indicated that Longhorn (the next generation of Windows) has no release date - but he did show a Longhorn feature that will allow searches of the text in any kind of file, including recently visited Web pages. There was also a demonstration of an 'implicit query' feature that locates lists of material on a topic, based on what words the user is typing at that moment.
Gates also showed off what he said was one of the first SPOT (Smart Personal Object Technology) watches. Using technology announced at last year's show, it downloads local weather and time data, plus news, from special broadcast sub-carriers of local commercial radio stations. He noted that his watch (which he said had four times the power of the first PC) adjusted to the local time zone and began showing local weather data as he arrived at the airport.
He also showed off a new application for IT managers that handles the distribution of security-related software patches. This, like his other announcements, drew applause, but that last item late drew considerable adverse comment from people who saw him as creating a product to address a problem that should not exist.
Also following tradition, Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy gave a keynote address that was filled with defiance for Microsoft. He touted the idea of network computing - where the network is the computer - and indicated that Sun (which lost more than 90 percent of its stock price in the last three years) can and will successfully compete in all areas with Microsoft (which lost about half.)
McNealy demonstrated a 'Windows-killer' user interface in development called Looking Glass, whose screen windows can be manipulated in three dimensions. In other words, they can appear to be pushed back, pulled forward, tilted and turned. You can even turn one over and put a note on the back.
Equally traditional was a press/analyst briefing just before the Gates keynote speech, where analyst Tim Bajarin spoke, giving his picks for favorite products at the show. He favored the Sharp Actius RD3D, a laptop with a 3D screen. Two images are displayed simultaneously, and a user with special glasses perceives a three-dimensional image. Touching a button switches it back to a two-dimensional display
He also liked the HP iPAQ h4350 PDA, its Qwerty-style thumb keyboard, with both WiFi and Bluetooth wireless options, hailing it as part of a new wave of more practical, wireless PDAs.
On the show floor, the average booth was a small exhibit that was part of an international pavilion. WiFi was everywhere, but no particular technical breakthroughs were evident. Some interesting things could be found, especially among the small booths, but any sample must be considered random.
For instance, a French start-up called Tixeo Soft was showing a software package called Workspace 3D. An office - real or virtual - can be laid out in virtual reality, with a screen showing what each person is working on. The workers themselves are represented by avatars which can examine each other's screens and talked to each other's avatars.
At the Korean hardware pavilion, a firm called Bestsoft was showing a full-body game controller. It was a thin column rising to about waist height from horizontal floor supports. Sensors on the floor supports detect the users' kicks, and sensors on top of the column sense the user's punches. This information is fed into a game machine to control kung-fu-style games. It was being demonstrated with a PS/2 game. The manager had a fright when Bill Gates visited the booth. Bestsoft thereupon decided to come out with a Microsoft Xbox version.
Gates was also spotted showing interest in a role-playing game based on Chinese mythology being shown at the Korean software pavilion by JYS Tech. But he may have just been responding to the subliminal appeal of the game's name: 'Gate to Heavens'. Gates was also seen showing interest in a French software firm called Intuilab, which offers a wireless interface involving graphics, gestures and voice.
Start-ups are rarely seen from Japan, but there was one on the show floor called Visionarts International. It offered software called Algebra, touted as turning a Web page into a workgroup environment.
Across town at the Mandalay Bay hotel/casino, Jupitermedia, a consulting firm in New York, had set up a rival show called cdXpo, later renamed Enterprise IT Week (EITW.) Evidently it was planned as a Comdex replacement when the bankruptcy filing left Comdex' future in doubt. When Comdex re-emerged, EITW show was repackaged to emphasize seminars. The organizers expected to get 10 percent of whatever traffic Comdex got, and by the end of the week were complaining that Comdex must not be getting much traffic. But they were also talking of putting EITW on again next year. But they were also saying that maybe Las Vegas was the wrong city, since today's executives have no patience with the place's distracting fažade of glitter.
As for Comdex, a booth space salesperson said that sales of space for next year were already brisk.
Lamont Wood