Holland Cooke Media 2008 Consumer Electronics Show
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"Imagine a day without your cell phone, PDA, computer or GPS.”
Consumer Electronics Association President Gary Shapiro, opening the 2008 CES International.
Notice that he didn’t say “Imagine a day without radio,” even though radio was the original electronic gadget. What happened?
If you’re a radio person attending the massive, mind-boggling CES, it’s apparent.
  • CEA projects USA sales of $171 billion in 2008, up 6% over 2007. “This growth rate is strong compared to the forecast for any other industry,” Shapiro crowed. “Even with an uncertain economy, consumers continue to demand our products.”
  • “In 2006 [most recent numbers available], other countries bought $220 billion in American-made high tech products. Those purchases accounted for one fifth of total U.S. exports, making high-tech America’s largest export sector.”
  • Radio people I have intrigued-into attending CES instantly “get it.” 140,000 attendees made this the world’s biggest convention. The Exhibit Hall is the size of 35 football fields. But CES mojo isn’t just quantity. There’s a quality to this culture that is very different from radio’s. Utterly customer-focused, this industry is hell-bent on change, making whatever-was-shiny-and-new last year obsolete this year. Meanwhile, FM stations vie to go all-Christmas-music first-in-the-market, and AM stations’ mostly-non-local programming mostly tells us that Conservatives are good and Liberals are bad.
"Bring friends and family together again, around a new kind of 'digital hearth.'"
Though you cannot see Panasonic President Toshihiro Sakamoto’s riveting keynote in its entirety, watch these highlights, including his introduction of the world's largest TV. His poise, passion, perfect English, and dazzling demonstrations should humble radio people with any naïve sense of entitlement.
"Rather than us-going-to the Internet, the Internet will come to us.”
Smashmouth lead singer Steven Harwell joins Intel President/CEO Paul Otellini onstage, and jams, in real-time with band members at separate remote locations, all shown as lifelike avatars.
See Bill Gates' Finale
"This is my last keynote. In July, I move from being a full-time employee at Microsoft to working full-time at the foundation. So this will be the first time since I was 17 that I won't have my full-time Microsoft job."
Comcast cable company now USA's 4th-biggest phone company.
And it's the USA's #1 Internet service provider.
Watch Comcast's Brian Roberts announce ground-breaking open architecture that eliminates the cable box, and invites collaboration, in CES' first-ever keynote by a cable CEO.
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