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COMDEX Opens with Smallest Attendance Ever

jgeelan writes "That's the verdict, anyhow, just posted on its main page by SYS-CON Media." Let's be realistic, does anything important really ever happen at COMDEX? The only thing I've ever got out of attending COMDEX is a horrible flu.

13 of 228 comments (clear)

  1. let me think... by nick-less · · Score: 5, Funny


    does anything important really ever happen at COMDEX?


    wasn't the Amiga 1000 introduced at COMDEX 1985?

  2. AMD-apple link by selderrr · · Score: 5, Interesting

    on the Apple rumours sites (forums.appleinsider.com, appleturns.com, www.mosr.com, www.macrumours.com, ...) there's a whole lot of babling going on anout AMD going in bed with Apple. Either for a hammer version of OSX, or AMD fabbing the next PPC...

    Prolly just nonsense, but exciting anyway..maybe..

  3. Eh? Am I missing something here? by Dr+Thrustgood · · Score: 5, Funny

    I always thought that, in computing at least, everything's *meant* to get smaller...

  4. Things I learned at Comdex by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Insightful

    1. Networking was going to be big
    2. Networking was going to be overvalued
    3. The bubble was about to burst.

    Don't know about the rest of you, but I made over $2 million just through going to Comdex. I think this was money well spent.

    I've also learned that the business people know as little as the rest of us about where things are going. Thir guesses are never right. They might make some good guesses about what market will do well, but its almost always for the wrong reasons.

  5. Booty! by Garg · · Score: 5, Funny

    The only thing I've ever got out of attending COMDEX is a horrible flu.

    I got my ComputerWorld button collection, a couple of T-shirts and a miniature basketball autographed by Spud Webb.

    Well, maybe that's why attendance is down... we've all got our offices decorated now.

    Garg

    --
    Garg
    Alumnus, Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters
  6. My tale of COMDEX by larsoncc · · Score: 5, Funny

    I went to COMDEX last year in the hopes of finding what everyone REALLY wants from COMDEX. T-Shirts.

    My boss and I wandered the aisles, looking at new technology vendors (who happened to be giving away shirts).

    We came across one friendly looking lady, with at least 7 BOXES of T-Shirts. HEAVEN! I proceed to lay down the geek-speak about how her product would fit into our organization, and I was getting a fairly good response. I felt the T-Shirt grab was "in the bag", so I asked for one.

    She looked right at me, smiled, and pointed to the table: "Have a bendy!" Looking at the table, I saw the prize for all of my effort. A wire, wrapped in a plastic/rubber substance. Basically, the prize was as complete of a waste of time as my conversation had been.

    To this day, whenever my boss talkes about getting screwed over by someone, he uses the phrase "Have a bendy!"

  7. COMDEX Opens with Smallest Attendance Ever by hottoh · · Score: 5, Informative

    The first Comdex had about 10k people.

    I think more than 10k people attended the first day.

  8. Big Things Are Happening! by scott1853 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Just look, Carly Fiorina announced a new slogan for HP! The only thing that could top that is if Gates got up and announced a new hologram for the CDs!!! What a great time to be a techie.

  9. Re:Feeling a Little Bitter? by quintessent · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So, where did the Slashdot poster get the phrase "smallest attendance ever" from? I didn't see that posted on SYS-CON. Was the poster smoking the carpet? Since when does "largest drop" mean "smallest ever"?

    It almost sounds like President Clinton and others talking about "paying off the deficit."

  10. There's nothing new. by IGnatius+T+Foobar · · Score: 5, Insightful
    There are two main reasons why COMDEX is failing:
    • The Web has largely made technology shows obsolete.
    • There's nothing new out there.
    The latter can be squarely blamed on the fact that the computer industry has become hostile to new ideas. Everything's gotta be the same old humdrum PeeCee stuff. Ten years ago, everyone was trying out new ideas. Nowadays, nobody wants to try anything new because there's no hope of making any money -- all good ideas are promptly stolen by Microsoft, Intel, Dell, Cisco, etc. ... who can do it bigger and cheaper.

    Is it any wonder that the only part of the tech world where change is really happening, is in the open source universe? Where the business rules don't apply?
    --
    Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
    1. Re:There's nothing new. by sacdelta · · Score: 5, Interesting

      There are at least 2 additional things that I believe are largely responsible for the recent drop in attendance that are directly the fault of the people who are organizing COMDEX.

      1) The way they handled the merging of the two venues. "Oh, Creative, we don't think you'll mind giving up the prime real estate for this location in the back corner." This decision drove out most of the multimedia people last year (I don't know if they came back this year). But even the thought that they might do the same thing again on such short notice has kept me from even considering a return this year.

      2) They are charging more for the small booths causing fewer businesses to use them. These booths are a major incentive for many people to show up. Everyone knows they can go on Microsoft's or IBM's website to see what they are up to, but it was very convenient to go to the show and see a bunch of smaller companies and see what they had available all in one place. But with higher fees, they are systematically driving those people out.

      These are things that weren't outside of their control.

      --

      Brought to you by: "Al"toids - the curiously weird mint.

  11. "Apple Computer": A Ridiculous LIberal Myth by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    For years, liberals and pinkos have rattled on and on about supposedly "superior" computers produced by the California lefties at Apple Computer. I will explain why this company is nothing more than a front for the International Communist Conspiracy, aided and abetted by their liberal fellow-travelers in the American computer community.

    This so-called "company" was founded by a pair of dope-smoking phone service thieves from Berkeley, a hotbed of Communist activity even today. "Apple Computer" supposedly went on to pioneer a graphical interface - actually developed by the good American patriots at Xerox - and develop its own hardware monopoly, just as its Communist creators would impose a state monopoly on all computer-using Americans.

    For a short time, this Red front tried to infiltrate the American business community by facetiously engaging in free trade practices, but this only served to disillusion its enthralled socialist followers who complained about a supposed drop in quality. What they really couldn't stand, like all liberals, was choice and capitalism. They only returned to "Apple" when it returned to its old crypto-Stalinist practices.

    "Apple Computer" is nothing more than a liberal-backed fifth column intended to subvert the American computer industry, and ultimately bankrupt good capitalist companies such as Microsoft and Intel. "Apple" isn't the only front group run by the International Communist Conspiracy. "Sun Microsystems" engages in similar monopolistic practices, trying to enforce a single hardware and software standard on all users, instead of the choices offered by Microsoft. Worst of all are the smaller Red fronts using the communist Linux operating system, with names like "Mandrake" (a French front, of course), and even really obvious ones like Red Hat! Linux is distributed under a Commie license that forces developers to give away the fruits of their labour, just as Marx ordered all good Communists to work as much as they could for a pittance in return in an illusory equal society.

    All of these so-called companies are just fronts for Communists and liberal fellow-travellers. Remember, when you buy Apple or download Linux, you're supporting Communism. Good Americans support real freedom-loving businesses like Microsoft and Intel.

    Laugh at me now, remember me later when you're all forced to used slow computers with horrid interfaces foisted upon an enslaved public by the commissars who used to fester in American business under the liberal myth that they were an independent company that loved capitalism called Apple Computer.

    1. Re:"Apple Computer": A Ridiculous LIberal Myth by pcs305 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Bill?