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Has CES Lost Its Star Appeal?
An opinion piece by tech writer David Gilbert looks at how CES might be losing some of its luster. "It's hard to know who the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) really benefits. A common perception is that CES is the place where all the major technology companies launch their latest and greatest gadgets. But this is simply not the case. Let's look at 2012 as an example. Last year's most talked about consumer technology products (in no particular order) were: the iPhone 5, iPad 3, iPad mini, Microsoft Surface, Samsung Galaxy S3, Google Nexus 7, Amazon Kindle Fire HD and the Wii U. How many were launched at CES 2012? None."
The journo in the article is saying that CES is failing because companies no longer use it to launch their latest iteration of gadget. Instead, it's being used to showcase their pie-in-the-sky aspirations. It's becoming less a PR mouthpiece, and more a tech demo for cool, but not production-ready, tech.
In my opinion, that can only be a good thing.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
But travelling halfway around the world to see someone from Jersey Shore launch a pair of headphones, just doesn't seem to be cut it anymore.
Yeah, that's reason enough for me to run for the hills.
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
An article that automatically plays two videos, one with full audio, upon being loaded? Such actions should preclude such articles from being posted.
Won't somebody please think of the bandwidth?!
Same with technology. It's a faceless world-wide empire of giant companies, no one cares except the people directly involved in creating the things. We just shop online, say "ohh shiny" and buy whatever.
Stuff is also a lot cheaper so there's less risk in buying things on sight alone. Back when an empty motherboard cost thousands of dollars, it made sense to spend time and money to check things out in person. Not anymore.
The only thing that can change that equation is booth babes.
Where is Ceren Ercen these days anyhow?
Mostly random stuff.
...to launch a product is suicide.
They have there own conferences and that is where they announce there latest and greatest product. Given that these companies are the ones with the advertising dollars it is no wonder CES isn't where the most talked about product launches are announced/demonstrated. That doesn't mean CES doesn't have cool stuff. It just means it is smaller companies and/or not leading products from the largest companies that end up at CES.
Also, lot if not all of those announcements were done by big companies doing their own, exclusive events, focused mostly single products, very awaited and with long enough preannoucements campaigns, usually not meant for shared space/attention with other companies.
Fairly well known musicians play at music festivals, where they can be one of many drawing people to go there. Superstars hold a concert and fill a stadium all by themselves. Why launch at CES if you're big enough to get all the attention you want on your own without sharing the spotlight?
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Microsoft is famously last to leave the party. Remember Comdex? After years of scatch-your-eyes-out boring keynotes by Bill Gates, it finally bit the biscuit. Microsoft kept going right to the bitter end. Replay at CES: Microsoft to announce the walking wounded XBox 720 without the remotest chance of keeping up with even mid specced PCs, and with idie revival the new game in town. Clue train on the way, last stop is Microsoft.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
CES's glory days were the 1980s, during the first personal computer boom. Then, everyone I think introduced stuff at CES... I remember reading old Compute! and Byte for goings on at the CES - there were reviews of the new Ataris, Apples, Commodores... and then I think even console systems were introduced there as well. So, CES meant, PC in its exciting newness, and already the luster faded a bit as computers became more commonplace. I imagine CES is still pretty cool, and if I were a retailer, I would think I'd want to check it out for the not marquee labels that introduce things that might still sell. But its not the center of the computing universe that, for one brief time, it was.
This is my sig.
2013 is the first year Microsoft has missed CES since 1995. In fact, either Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer usually delivers the CES keynote. This year, no booth, no Surface, no Windows 8, no Windows Phone, no Xbox, nada.
2013 also marks the shift in scheduling: AEE (Adult Entertainment Expo, the industry convention for porn stars) is now being held the week *after* CES, instead of *the same week* on the Vegas strip (which used to give both presenters and attendees extra incentive to book a trip to CES).
Coincidence? Ah yeah, I guess..
The idea of a tradeshow somehow being important is just stupid. Its companies showcasing their products, they dont need a show to do that. They could just do it themselves without wasting millions of dollars. Samsung want to show off some kick ass new tv with video, descriptions and pictures? They could do that on their website anytime they want to.
Tradeshows are basically just scams run by the people who operate them. Companies spend a lot of money and time and energy to be at them for no real reason. If companies actually collectively said "We spent like 8 million bucks going to e3 and ces. How about we dont do that this year, save 8 million bucks and just advertise on our websites" then ces would be no more and millions would be saved.
I know tradeshows are just ways of getting advertising time and all but I just dont give a shit.
1- I still cant own or purchase items at a tradeshow so I dont care.
2- I can read about products in articles on companies websites or read related news on websites I frequent.
3- You dont actually learn anything from tradeshows and can not get an honest opinion because youre seeing a carefully crafted and setup demo unit. You dont get to see the real world end product or hear opinions on it from people who have used the product for any length of time in the real world. I dont buy tech stuff anymore until its been out atleast a month.
4- Tradeshows made a lot of sense back in the day. But when I can read previews before a product even comes out at a hundred websites, see a thousand video reviews once it comes out and basically get every single bit of information I could possibly want and a whole lot more on the internet anytime I want it, why do I need a tradeshow? The internet and google are my personal tradeshow thats there for me 24 hours a day. You can get information anywhere and anytime you want now. Back in the day all you had were magazines and occasional newsletters so a tradeshow was important because it allowed people to connect, but now I can connect with anyone in the world while sitting on a toilet in a airplane flying over the ocean.
I get so much god damn advertising, sales pitches and annoying slogans thrown at me in my life everyday the last thing I want is to subject myself to more of it in a giant room of high concentration sales people. I went to e3 awhile back 3 years in a row and god damn, the was enough to last me my whole life.
Similar to what happen to COMDEX.. Was a great show then they just got so big and expensive that people just didnt show up any more. Why wait a year to announce something, With the web and socail netwroks anyday and be a big announcement day.
> "How many were launched at CES 2012? None."
Even Belladonna introduced her latest VigorTech(r) WiFi remote-controlled dildory elsewhere. Even the basement at CES is empty now.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I remember when CES stood for Computer Electronics Show.
Wikipedia, search ces, will give a very short story.
Yes, CES has perhaps outlived any sort of usefulness other than charging a few K$ to the company's expense account.
The internet, aka world wide web, can not provide the Cubicle Ladies Lab Dancing To My 100 dollar bills stuffed strategically into their bikini panties. :) \m/
Oh the joys of remembrance on a cold winters night.
Thank you for this posting.
I was in my local computer store a few weeks ago, the store is now cut in half, a minimum of products and just one employee working. Back from the mid 90's to mid 2000's that store was always hopping, 4 or 5 people working at any time, always full of customers, ads and weekly flyers. Most of the other local computer stores closed up in the 2005-2008 range. Electronics have lost their appeal, they are becoming like appliances. People don't rush out and line up to buy the new 2013 kenmore microwave or get excited the new maytag washer has 1 more washing mode than before.
A show about Consumer Electronics that is not attended by Apple is a fail right from the word go.
Ever since they kicked out the consumer.
We don't really need trade shows to show us new products and technology anymore.
#DeleteChrome
I went to CES for a few years... And I must say after going 3 year in a row, it get REALLY BORING... It all the same stuff years after years... There is a few good finds, but there is just soo much stuff that you can get to miss the good one.
I'll skip another year before going again.
Well mini-Microsoft, aka Nokia are presumably also attending to show off their new and exciting Windows RT tablet product and their range of 'top' selling Windows phones?
Apple does attend CES -- last year they had 250 or so people attending . No, they don't have a booth, but they felt the need to spend a couple of million dollars to have people go to stay in touch with the consumer zeitgeist.
And that's the whole reason for trade shows. I would never go to a trade show to find information on a particular product -- if I know what I'm interested in, there are a number of better ways to find out about it online. What is unique and vital about trade shows is the serendipity. I see one product here, one presentation there, talk to an old buddy at lunch, and all of a sudden I can put those things together into something new and revolutionary.
I'll be there!
I love Mondays. On a Monday, anything is possible.
The prototype ASUS Eee Pad MeMO ME370T was revealed at CES 2012 and its release delayed when Google chose it as the Nexus 7.
In stark contrast to the original commentator's thoughts on CES' irrelevancy, BBC News this weekend published a fairly insightful article looking forward to how CES has been (and will continue to be) adapting to follow the zeitgeist. It also mentioned how a Chinese company snapped up most of the premium floorspace previously occupied by Microsoft...
I think we'll see many more mobile device iterations and perhaps some new product (soft?)launches at CES this year. Sure, MWC is the destination event for mobile devices, but CES started as a spinoff of a music conference, its scope is more than broad enough to survive a while longer. And hey, there's first generation production OLED screens to be demoed! You won't see those in Barca.
10 print hello world 20 goto 10
No.
They're still writing articles about CES that these submissions link to, right?
Just like ComDex, CES is becoming irrelevant due to the internet. The whole point of trade shows was always to get the reporters and salesman in front of new products and (hopefully) generate some positive press leading to consumer demand. Once the internet started to go big, and magazine reviews weren't quite as necessary for product exposure, the tradeshows tried to almost evolve into entertainment expos.
The final nail in the coffin has been when individual studios or manufacturers get enough industry cloud to host their own tradeshow, which just fractures the already weakened idea.
CES reminds me a lot of Kodak and Polaroid and other older businesses that have chosen to brute force their way into the future, rather than change their models to fit it. It never works out.
Trade shows have been in decline due to the internet (and, to some extent, cheap overnight delivery) since the late '90s. It's surprising to me that CES has remained so popular 10 years after the demise of Comdex. Who needs a trade show when you can get all complete information online and sample products overnight?
i got this external blu ray writer
came with software tiger direct posters said oh great no issues etc
i get it home it works great to watch them BUT i cant burn my own videos , i have to put that pc on the net ( its a expensive one and i dont want to....) and then pay and upgrade...what a fucking scam.
on the flipside the cost of blurays is now quite nice
i bought a total of 19 blurays for about 160$ after taxes
just about 4 n change each....and some were box sets.
I'm not sure that's so wise for a consumer show? If it was a tech enthusiast show maybe. I wouldn't bring my unfinished goods to market... don't keep consumers waiting or else!
I'm afraid some things are still better done in person. We have video conferencing technology, why fly across the country?
Check out nikonrumours.com, nikon is slated to release the D5200 around that time.
las vegas is a fascinating environment. best to know poker odds .
I'd like to have a cheap electronic organizer with keyboard that can be synced to PC, runs on ordinary AAA batteries and has more than one year of battery life. They used to make them in the 90s but I can't seem to find one now.
Is there anything like this at CES?
Let's think:
1. Down economy -- people are rethinking how much they "need" these new things
2. Lack of creativity -- companies seek to control whole classes of products through patent legislation which, hopefully enables them to slow the release of new things so that they can sell new versions of the same old sheit with a couple of new things or changes.
CES may lose some of it's star appeal, but as long as it's still upstairs from the porn convention it's sure not going to lose any of its popularity.
We used to sneak downstairs during breaks. It may have changed, but in the early days a vendor badge got you in either place.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I remember the president of Encom saying that if you've seen one, you have seen them all.
What made "headlines" is not really what the show was about. There are thousands of innovative retail ready or retail close items at CES. Just not ones that catch the big headlines. Phones are big right now in the media and blogs. Without big phone announcements for people to jump on does not mean CES is dead. TBieber and the Kardigans are not the only two out there.
Take a picture tour of some of the previous CES shows.
http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/4/3828848/ces-photo-history
In my opinion, CES is a show where vendors can showcase their offerings to the media, industry, etc. It's not about showcasing popular gadgets. If so, based on the Apple love lately, it would simply be held in an Apple showroom. My thought is that It benefits smaller companies the most, since moves by larger companies are already followed by the media.
"ASUS Eee Pad MeMO ME370T"
Wow, did someone get paid to come up with this name?