Bill Gates Show Loses Its Lustre

For one day a year, the hottest ticket in Las Vegas is not for a pop star or sporting event but for a computer geek - when Microsoft's co-founder Bill Gates gives the opening keynote speech for Comdex, the giant computer trade show.

Last night more than 10,000 people crammed into the MGM Garden Arena, many of them hoping for something that would revive the depressed IT industry. Instead, they got what was largely an extended Microsoft commercial.

A revivalist message was certainly needed in Las Vegas this year. The 23rd annual Comdex/Fall has shrunk from something that dominated the city to a level where it doesn't even fill the Las Vegas Convention Center. The number of exhibitors has plunged from 2,337 in 2000 to about 1,100 this year. While the number of visitors is not yet known, everyone expects the attendance will be down, possibly below 125,000.

Depending on how things go, the show's organiser, Key3Media, may decide to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy at the end of the week, according to Associated Press.

Reversing the economic cycle, and getting Americans to travel the way they did before 9/11, are clearly beyond even Gates's Harry Potter-style wizardry. However, Microsoft's power does allow it to launch "platforms" that other companies can build hardware around, write software for, or simply sell, thus giving the market a stimulus.

Gates often uses his Comdex keynote to present new platforms to a global audience, the most recent example being Tablet PCs with built-in handwriting recognition. This year, Gates did show off a few if the results, including Dell's first palmtop computer, a handful of Tablet PCs, and remote screen displays, code-named Mira, which have yet to reach the shops. But this year, there was little that was new for the industry to exploit.

Gates did, as expected, unveil Microsoft Spot, or Smart Personal Object Technology. This is based on the idea of personalising electronics devices. A smart alarm clock, for example, could know your schedule and collect appropriate information.

If you were flying to Microsoft's home town of Seattle -- the example demonstrated -- it could check the weather, traffic conditions and flight times. A Spot-based alarm is expected to go on sale next year, but the whole idea could turn out to be a dog.

There may, of course, be a large market for smart personal devices such as TV sets and smart-top boxes, digital cameras, handheld computers and mobile phones. But instead of saving Comdex, all these are more likely to boost the rival Consumer Electronics Show (CES), which is held in Las Vegas in January. Gates provides a keynote for that show, too.