Jan´s Blog Spot

Well then – by public demand: a few words about this year’s AppleExpo in Paris, but no pictures, since I didn’t take any (sorry…). Since I have the privilege of living in Paris since mid 2004 this was the forth time I went to see the AppleExpo and there has been some change since 2004. First of all: I could still kick myself for not having bought any Apple stock by the end of last year when the first rumors about the iPhone were out: the first big change was that the Expo was a lot more crowded (as in “easily twice as many people”) than it used to be which is just one more indicator that Apple’s star (and thus the stock) definitely is on the rise.

This also became apparent when I arrived at the entrance where I actually had to queue instead of walking right in – and that despite having my ticket ordered over the web and a printed version of the voucher for a free badge with me. Once inside I found the one big rumor confirmed, there was no trace of the iPhone – at least nowhere near Apple’s own stand, they were “only” showing off the new iMacs and iPods, so nothing really new. From all I heard that despite the early reports that Orange (i.e. France Télécom) had secured the exclusive deal for the iPhone in France, there still seems to be a lot more than tiny details to be ironed out. The French do have a tendency to have to have it their way, just as Steve Jobs does. And while the French clearly outnumber Steve, he’s still the one who’s got the iPhone. Could become interesting.

All the other exhibitions were more or less the same as last year, to me the most notable thing about the exhibitors was that their number has clearly decreased despite the increase of public interest, e.g. SonyEricsson were nowhere to be seen and also FastMac stayed at home this year. I’m not quite sure if that is more due to the weak Dollar or that Apple decided to only make the Paris show a B-event two years ago – or something else I missed…

The IMO nicest stand of the fair belong to a company that has only very little to do with Apple: Mini – whose excuse for being at a computer show was to show people just how great the Mini works as an iPod accessory. They were quite convincing – no wonder Apple silently dumped the Hi-Fi, after all who wants a dull white box when you can have speakers on wheels?.

And finally: the honorary mention for this year’s Expo clearly goes to Griffin Technology, one the companies who makes all kinds of accessories for Apple products, as for example the iTrip. To make a long story short: one of the friends I met with at the Expo had some trouble with the iTrip she had bought a while back so we asked one of the staff at the Griffin stand, who after a few minutes talk told us that the unit might be defective and then just smiled and did not only give her a brand new one for free but had two more for my other friend and me. Nice

Any comments or questions? If so, feel free to post them here…

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