The January Juggernaut Begins

Today marks the end of a two week respite of sorts. By working from Cascais, Portugal and now Paris, France I was able to spend time with friends and still work remotely using a combination of blazing fast 60 meg symetircal broadband in Cascais, and mobile technology when I was out and about.

But, starting Monday, with Pepcom Digital Experience as a prelude to CES in Las Vegas, the January Juggernaut begins, with plenty of hardware and apps finding their way to us all. Right on the heels of CES in New York is the annual National Retail Federation conference and trade show begins on January 13. There, whats new for retail and e-tail makes their marks. Then over in Hawaii, the annual Pacific Telecommunications Council conference takes hold on January 20th before we end the month with IT Expo East starting on January 30th in Miami Beach, FL.

So what does this all mean? Well for starters it means a lot of NEW and a great deal of hype being played out. What's old doesn't make the news as much, and speculation on what will be the next big things starts to mount. In reality a lot of that work began months before and really goes live during the events, and surrounding activity points, taking what was once an ideal or concept, all the way through to the finished goods.

For the media it will mean long hours, races to beat their competitors to the news that will break down into there categories:

1. New and Shiny-this is where press releases rule, where notes about something new comes out, where testing and validation are not part of the news. Largely, the informaton comes from the companies, and sometimes a third party speculates.
2. Release and Review-here, what's new actually gets tested or reviewed by the reporter, with some degree of experience ranging from holding it in their hands, having someone show them the features to having actually used the product or app for enough time to share their views on how good (or bad) it is, or if it's worth buying, trying or should be passed up.
   
   
3. Insight, Perspective and Opinion-This is perhaps the most valuable but least found writing or coverage weeks of shows. It means someone takes the time to look at what's "new" and evaluate it's impact on society, business or the market at large. It's less about the wow factors that seem to envelope the news during show weeks, and more about the what it means and how things will change, could be different or be the means to make things different.

For those on the other side of the screen, it means information overload, too much delivered that looks to be the same, and the need for greater curation, aggregation and what none of us have. Time. Starting Monday, January 7, we become time famished, time challenged and time contrained. Hopefully some of the new products and services find a way to eliminate those...but I doubt it....