Our IT Rockstar for 2008 is currently living it up Las Vegas style at the CES Expo! We will be updating his experiences and scandals daily so keep checking in to hear all about his trip… and remember it could be YOU for 2009! 

9th January 2009

Hi everyone,

I’ve had a bit of a mission trying to get Wordpress going here, so am sticking to a good old HTML page to do my CES updates - so no RSS sorry. Vegas is a pretty amazing place! It’s been a long time since I’ve been here, and a lot has changed.

I’ve put up a photo gallery on my Facebook page which is here. They’re general Vegas snaps at the moment, but I’ll setup a dedicated CES one with all of the latest gadgets later today.

Latest photos: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=70386&l=fa241&id=584476885

CES Wrap - Day 1

Well, where do I start? I’ve had my first day at CES and it’s huge - there is so much to see and do that getting around the whole thing in four days is going to present a real challenge.

Today, I focused mainly on the “big booths” that I had heard being publicised before the show started. My first port of call was Microsoft, and their booth certainly didn’t disappoint. Other than a few casual jokes about the collapse of a number of their Zune players on New Years Day, they had a host of great presentations and were really pushing their Windows Home Server platform. They also had a pretty cool array of Xbox 360’s with a large multiplayer competition of Geras of War 2 which was very cool. They also showed off their new line of Zune players - which have built-in wireless networking so you can share your music with other Zune owners. They seem pretty confident that these are going to rival the iPod, but personally I can’t see it happening.

The next booth I spent some time at was the Intel stand. They had quite a few cool innovations, with a lot of their presentations and displays focusing on netbooks and mobile processing. They also had a gaming setup to show the power of their quad core processors - including a very cool racing rig with multiple screens which was pretty awesome. I gave it a bit of a nudge, but given my perfomance I think I’m better off sticking to IT than looking at a career in Formula 1.

The coolest thing I have seen so far, are some awesome 3D TV glasses that you can watch movies and television on. I spent quite a bit of time getting a proper demo and looked at the difference between 2D and 3D - it has to be seen to be believed. The company making these are in talks with an Australian company about distribution, so hopefully we might be able to see some of these on our shores in the not to distant future. They hook up to any AV source, and at $149 USD - they’re not bad bang for bucks.

Don’t forget, you can potentially win the same trip as me (where you choose the conference) - make sure you don’t miss out and enter for the 2009 competition. Also a huge thanks to 920 for making this happen.
I’ll put up another post after today’s rounds at the show - plus a heap of new photos.

Cheers,

Adam

The big event in 2008 was our search for NZ’s next IT Rockstar. Whether you developed a snappy piece of code, fixed a nasty bug that no one else could fix or delivered a multi-million dollar project on time and on budget you (or someone you nominate) you could have been in the running for the big prize!

 Adam Brown, founder of First In and Yellow Fever websites, took out the prize in 2008 - being crowned NZ’s first IT Rockstar!! He is off to Las Vegas in January 2009 to cause havoc in true Rockstar fashion!

Back in 2009 - Bigger and Better!

Check out the website www.itrockstar.co.nz for more information on how you could become NZ’s IT Rockstar for 2009!

 

The winner gets an all-expenses paid trip to the IT equivalent of Glastonbury - Technosium, CeBIT, Interop, ITING or another world-class event!

Interop – Las Vegas – May, New York, Moscow, Tokyo, Sao Paulo

The three day Conference merges thought leadership across the range of IT areas with a focus on interoperability - more important than ever as a surge of new technologies promises unprecedented access to information and increased productivity.

CeBIT – Hanover

The biggest trade show for the ICT sector worldwide – universally regarded as the leading showcase for the global market. In Hanover you’ll get insight into the future digital age. 6,153 exhibitors from 77 countries and 480,000 visitors from all over the world attended CeBIT 2007, without counting the 8,000 journalists from across the globe.

Technosium 2008 – Santa Clara

The largest technology and products event in Silicon Valley. The event will showcase the latest products in info security, storage, networking, software and wireless, plus there’s a full conference program with keynote speakers from all over the world. It’s a great opportunity to discuss real solutions powered by technology face to face with industry experts. More than 8,000 attendees are expected.

ITING – Las Vegas

The International Conference on Information Technology - New Generations (ITNG) is an annual event focusing on state of the art digital information and communication technologies across everything from astronomy, biology, education, geosciences, security, health care and more. You’ll see visionary ideas, theoretical and experimental results, as well as prototypes, designs, and tools. The conference features keynote speakers, the best student award, a technical open panel, and workshops/exhibits from industry, government and academia.