Adobe Blues In Las Vegas
Writing the first Adobe Illustrator Blues blog post reminded me of the encounter my husband/partner and I had with Adobe at the 2006 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Ready to hit the Halls
This is the largest Electronics Show on Earth. As we were attending as Press we were there every day, and as usual it was a wonderful experience. No one gets better free perks or food at Vegas Conferences than the press. Unless of course you are the head of Sony or Yahoo- then that is a whole other story.
Exhibiting at the CES it is like going to the Senior Prom. The largest electronics Companies in the world trying to outdo each other in sheer pizzazz.
Sony Display- serving up cold drinks and hot games.
We reveled in the smell of new electronics, brilliant lighting, fabulous audio and larger than life displays from the moment we entered the halls. On the first day we gathered our press-kits and just wandered around. We arranged interviews for the following days with various company heads and took some candid shots.
The immortal Jon Anderson at XM. Following him was his co-immortal, Todd Rundgren.
C|Net Recording Stage
Audiophonic area at HDTV's Display
By the second day I realized that we had not yet seen Adobe, the biggest graphics company in the world- recently joined with Macromedia, home of Flash Animation. We were really looking forward to seeing what kind of imaginative display they had put together. I was hoping for something interactive, perhaps with giant plasma screens and work stations where you could play with software in real time. We were also looking forward to talking with the Adobe reps about the Macromedia buy. Of special interest to us as my better half had been one of the developers on the team that originally created the cell animator that became ‘Flash’, pre-Macromedia.
After asking around, checking maps and deliberate hunting we finally found the Adobe/Macromedia ‘Display’.
Adobe/Macromedia Booth at the CES 2006, Las Vegas
We missed it because we were looking for something large; not something resembling a supersized Dilbert Cubicle. I honestly thought it was a bathroom sign hanging on the wall. I had to look twice.
huh?
Shocked, we wandered in. Nothing inside but a few generic looking tables, chairs, and brochure racks- all in gray. The tall,pc-clad Adobe people (also in gray) completely ignored us until one came over to ask, rather haughtily, if we ‘had an appointment’. We replied that we were there to set an appointment. The gentleman said ‘sorry’ – they were not giving interviews with any press unless the appointment were pre-set. This generally means “scripted questions”. Then they asked us to leave. He said ‘press’ with the same inflection normally reserved for ‘cockroach’.
It was as if we had accidentally wandered into the inner sanctum of the Queen of England.. Hitting this ice-cold wall at Adobe after meeting such open, wonderful people everywhere else was bizarre. Watching from outside the open door for a while we noted that everyone who wandered in got the same reception. Sharply tilted nose and cold shoulder included.
Apparently Adobe had forgotten that they were attending the Consumer Electronics Show. For most companies this is a chance for some solid interaction with the people who purchase and use their goods on a regular basis. And it means they get a chance to pull out the extraordinary toys they have been busy developing and show them off before they hit the store shelves.
Play time at Gibsons extraordinary club-style tent- Free drinks and live stage shows attracted major crowds.
From the look and feel of Adobes ‘display’ they couldn’t be bothered with consumers, nor did they have anything to show anyone.
Adobe, you know I love you. I would not be here if not for you and you know it .. Most of your software is simply divine. But it is time to climb down off of that stratospheric pedestal and get back down to earth and in touch with the people who brought you this far. Or like all companies who lose touch with thier clients, your lifespan as an active corporation in the creative community will be greatly shortened.
Wow if it weren't for the pictures, I would have thought you were hallucinating. This is an amazing show, like you said, one in which everyone proudly parades out their product to sell it! Perhaps adobe knows they now have zero competition. Quark is as ineffective as grandpa, and Xara is just beginning to come to market. Corel seems to be that bastard everyone loves, but no one will admit it. And Macromedia has married into the giant family, so many are reminiscent of the good old days of Freehand.
Adobe dropped the ball on this, but I am wondering if it's reflective of the real corporate attitude. Or if they just registered late for the show. If they continue with their hooity-tooity appearence the consumers will not suffer with that. Then...*shiver* maybe microsoft or Apple's own publishing programs may become mainstream.
Athyrius,
I do agree that Adobe should have had a presence at the show for consumers. What you stumbled upon is simply their media booth. They set this up only for media relations.
So, most companies will have both a show-room floor exhibit for consumers and a separate media relations booth.
Your blog post speaks to another reason why Adobe needs to be out on the exhibit floor. Designers have blogs, some of which are just as influential as traditional media. If Adobe is a no show or tries to hide from the new media, word will get around and it could cause more harm than good for them.
The only way to get to force Adobe to the table for designers is to create software that bridges an existing Adobe product to other products, which they will not have in their product line. I am releasing soon a free download that uses the PhotoShop automation engine to directly create HTML pages(free) and SWFs(buy cheap), bypassing many peoples need for Macromedia Flash. This type of development may be why they don't want to give anyone a peek at the new PSD/SWF format design software that everyone will have to buy (again!).
I am sure they will name the file extension .MAD for how angry the consumers really will be. The only reason I am able to develop software like this is that I never signed the SDK 7 license agreement, which crushed the life out of most developers. Macromedia before the merger bought out most of the independent developers it thought were a threat to its individual products.
Steven K said: "I do agree that Adobe should have had a presence at the show for consumers. What you stumbled upon is simply their media booth. They set this up only for media relations."
Actually, we had the list of media booths, meeting places and had attended pre-show exhibits and conferences as press. This Dilbert style box was on the exhibit floor and was on the exhibitors/attendees map as The Adobe-Macromedia Exhibit.
We are very familiar with CES and other large Las Vegas Conferences as we reside in the mountains just outside of LV and make it a habit to attend as many conferences within our fields of interest as time permits.
There was no confusion involved here about what and where. Adobe should have a constant, visible and accessable presence at CES, especially in 2006 with the Macromedia buy. If they want a separate, private media relations area- as do many companies- then by all means they should. And there shouldn't be any confusion about where to place a private media area. Common sense would tell you, if not a bit of research and communication with the CES authorities, it should not go on the exhibit floor.