Author: Robin 'Roblimo' Miller
This time I focused on “major” exhibitors. Gallery number three will look at smaller exhibitors, both commercial and non-profit. You’ll see stories about many of these projects and companies on NewsForge in coming months. Half of the reason for a reporter to go to a trade show or conference is to make contacts for future stories. You can’t write but a small fraction of the ones you run across during the show itself and do them justice. There’s just too much going on.
Some general impressions:
– Red Hat is giving away red hats like mad a few feet inside the entrance, so there are red hats everywhere.
– As usual, many show attendees are making their way back to the “dot-org pavilion” where the non-profits set up. IDG gets rave reviews
from most of the “dot-org” people for their willingness to help these no-money show participants attend. Neither we nor IDG can afford to forget that without the open source projects these little booths represent, there would be no LinuxWorld. (I went around, shook hands, and said “Thanks!” to people who have created some of the software I use daily. More people should do this. It’s always appreciated.)
– Most vendor people I’ve talked to have declared this a “good show” — which means they are satisfied with the amount of traffic. LinuxWorlds
the past few years have left some vendors unhappy with the number of people who came to their booths. Companies spend frightful sums to exhibit at shows like these, and if they don’t get enough leads and eventual sales in return, they don’t come back. I think most of this show’s vendors are happy and will be be around at future LinuxWorlds.
Enough talk. Let’s get to the photos…
| Free Software Foundation’s Brad Kuhn |
| One of the most embarrasing LinuxWorld penguins we’ve ever seen, but if it makes Computer Associates happy and brings in customers, who are we to argue? |
| IBM’s slogan: “Linux is everywhere.” At this show, “IBM is everywhere” would be true, too. Lots of lit-up IBM stuff all over the place. This pic is of their booth, which has glowing partitions… everywhere. |
More on page 2…
| Real is here like mad, boasting about their open source-ness — and smiling about it. |
| Oracle has a whole long line of terminals you can use to learn about “Unbreakable Linux.” No one seems to have broken any of them. |
| Red Hat nearly threw these hats into the crowd, and the crowd pushed in to get them. |
| We have no idea who these people are, but they sent us more pre-show PR spam than anyone. |
| SUSE’s presentations bring in massive crowds. Maybe it’s the cuddly gecko dolls they’re giving away, eh? |
| Plenty to see here. Please don’t move along. Come in and buy something from HP! |
More on page 3…
| “Don’t you just love Intel’s 64-bit Itanium?” |
| “Don’t you just love AMD’s 64-bit Opteron?” |
| Progeny’s John Daily |
| There’s a room near the press lounge that exhibitors can rent to hold press conferences. This is what “the press” looks like from the podium when you’re conferencing them. (A reporter is asking a question, so everyone’s looking at him, not the speaker.) |
| Touting the glories of Novell and its new-found love for Linux and open source. |
| Touting the glories of Sun Microsytems and its new-found love for Linux and open source. |
| Microsoft’s Martin Taylor (left) agrees to do a Slashdot interview in front of at least 50 witnesses. I gave him a card. Think he’ll actually contact me to set it up? |
