CES - Day 3 - Wakeup Call and CES Zoo

Day three started off as all other CES days. Wake up at 6am, meet the crew for breakfast downstairs at 7am, hop in the rental car and be over at the Venetian to open the demo suite by 8am. Overall foot traffic was a bit slower through the room than the past two days, but we heard the same thing from all exhibitors on the upper levels today. I decided to sacrifice touring the Venetian/Sands Expo downstairs again today in order to give myself more time to cover the upper floor exhibits. Keep in mind I've only got about an hour to eat lunch, snap some shots, and get listening impressions, so every minute counts.

Tomorrow I've got to visit what's become known as "the zoo", the Las Vegas Convention Center, to meet with existing and potential vendors. This is the place people see on the evening news when they do their 30 second blurb coverage of CES. It houses all of the more common consumer electronics manufacturers and is, in a word, HUGE!!! Computers, cell phones, TV's, car audio, home theater, cameras, MP3 players, etc... Yeah, it looks cool on TV, but it tends to be a place we in the high-end area try to avoid. There are shuttles which run all day transporting attendees back and forth between the two locations, and there is always a long line to get on, they are always packed, and typically take way longer than they should to get there. Plus navigating through the chaos can be overwhelming for first timers and even after spending several days there one can easily not see everything. Yup, I wouldn't trade it for most anything. It is near heaven for electronic dorks like myself.

Oh! I almost forgot. The Venetian also hosts another popular convention that runs near concurrent with CES. It's the Adult Entertainment expo and annual award ceremonies. I mean, it is Vegas for Pete sakes, so where else would one expect something like this to take place? But it is still a sight to see these "actors" hanging out all around the casino (pun intended). And finding yourself standing in line behind Ron Jeremy while waiting to get on the elevator is bit awkward. Yeah, I don't know what that means either...only in Vegas.

Cheers,

Mike