CES 2008: What have we learned this week?

Scott Fulton, BetaNews: It's the end of our full week of coverage of the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show, so one last time, I'd like to call in our Senior CES Analyst, Sharon Fisher. Sharon, here's what I'm wondering tonight, and I'd like to see if you agree:

Usually CES is a gadget show. We walk away from it talking about the coolest thing you can hold in your hand. This time around, I got the distinct feeling that it was a platform show.

Sharon Fisher, BetaNews Senior CES Analyst: There's a lot to that. Look at the way the TV manufacturers were integrating the Internet directly into their products, making partnership arrangements, etc. It's getting to be like COMDEX.

Scott: Here we have a show that was more devoted to platforms this year than before...and you would have thought that the platform company, Microsoft, would have made a bigger show of it.

Sharon: Right, especially since IPTV has been so successful.

Scott: Rather than bring Windows or Windows Media to the table, they seemed to bring Mediaroom and Silverlight. So perhaps, in a strange way, we've gotten what we deserve and what we asked for at the same time...Microsoft's becoming just another company.

Sharon: I don't think Windows is nimble enough to be usable for that sort of thing. It's going to be interesting to see what becomes of them once Bill becomes emeritus.

Scott: Well, we got a peek today with the announcement that one of Microsoft's biggest "suits," Jeff Raikes, is leaving in September.

Sharon: Spending more time with his family?

Scott: He'll be replaced with Stephen Elop, the former head of Macromedia. The guy who helped make Flash and Dreamweaver into a creative suite.

Sharon: Right. Though from what I understand early adopters of Vista haven't been thrilled with all the graphic bells and whistles.

Scott: And a guy who once told BusinessWeek after he left Adobe (which had acquired his company) that he'd like very much to be a CEO again. Not an old guy.

Sharon: Interesting...How does he feel about being in a spoof video every year?

Scott: Well, he might just do it. He seems the type.

Sharon: You know whom I'm surprised not to see here at CES? Google.

Scott: Yea, talk about a platform company.

Sharon: I mean, they're here, in a small way, but not much. And they're definitely working on making themselves ubiquitous. And Sergey Frin and Larry Page have some of the rock star persona that Gates has.

Scott: They should show up in red blazers, one with a guitar, the other with a bass...Do you think Android would have been an attention-grabber if it had made a big splash this year?

Sharon: The thing I find really interesting about them is the sort of speakers they get into Google. Google is becoming a cultural phenomenon, not just software.

Scott: Forgive me for being the permanent skeptic, though, but every time I see some big cultural phenomenon that uses a handful of oft-repeated though carefully selected words, but otherwise a limited game plan, I naturally get suspicious. [insert reference to political candidate here]

Sharon: They do neat stuff, though. And it's all open. The sorts of applications people are building onto Google Maps and Google Earth are just phenomenal.

Scott: Well, suppose CES really does become more of a platform show for 2009. Do you think Google could do a keynote? Could they supplant Microsoft's position at the Sunday keynote?

Sharon: They aren't any less relevant than Microsoft...and one could argue more. Look at YouTube...I think they'd do a great job. One could argue they have more friends to do cameos than Bill has.

Scott: Would they have to be a phone company too to get a ticket to that keynote...in other words, do they need a gadget, a "Zune," if you will?

Sharon: There's a rumored Googlephone.

Scott: There's always a rumored Google phone.

Sharon: There was a rumored Apple phone, too. And last year it happened.

Scott: If they brought that out next year, would it be Sergey's and Larry's Steve Jobs moment?

Sharon: I actually wish they would stay away from hardware. The one problem with platforms is then you have vendor lock. I don't want to hear that I have to pick out a vendor for my TV and Internet and phone and music and somehow try to tie it all together. I want to pick out the best things for me and have them all work seamlessly.

Scott: But you still think they could get away with a keynote at CES without being a gadget producer per se?

Sharon: Microsoft did.

Scott: For a while. And then they got an Xbox and a Zune. I don't think they'd still be there without them. Windows is pretty much dead from a buzz standpoint.

Sharon: True. But it's not like the Zune is setting the world on fire either, and it's the Wii that all my cousins were nuts for, not an Xbox.

Scott: Back to the phone business for a minute: I had expected to see more of a "rush" by other manufacturers to produce something similar to or like the iPhone. But what I saw instead were companies doing a kind of end-around. Rather than taking the route HTC and others started to take, where they produced a slick black panel with a touch screen.

Sharon: Right. Apple doesn't do the platform, to go back to your earlier thought. It's just the gadget.

Scott: We saw Nokia and Motorola pitching the platform, and then showing some decent gadgets -- maybe not pretty ones, but decent -- that justify the platform.

Sharon: Exactly. Because the gadgets aren't going to tie people in. If you build a decent platform, you get the gadget manufacturers comng to you. And there's always going to be a new gadget.

Scott: That was a surprise to me, though: I expected a lot of iPhone-a-likes.

Sharon: I see ads for them occasionally. But you're right, they didn't make a big splash at the show.

Scott: Maybe there's a new strategy for "obsoleting" the iPhone: Not outclassing it, but stranding it, building around it, maybe with digital TV or 4G. But something that doesn't look or feel like the iPhone.

Sharon: Well, keep in mind that that was one of the big criticisms a year ago when the iPhone came out: that people weren't satisfied with the network platform underneath.

Scott: That could be its biggest weakness -- more so than its closed attitude toward applications.

Sharon: And don't forget that non-replaceable battery. It's going to be interesting to see what happens when people's batteries start dying. Meanwhile, Google is all about being open, to go back to them.

Scott: Big Question Time: What's the most astounding thing you learned this week?

Sharon: That Panasonic sold 5,000 of the 103-inch TVs they introduced last year.

Second, that Sprint is proceeding with WiMAX. That's really good news.

Scott: Best of luck to the new and improved Sprint.

Sharon: The other is the big expanson of the Comcast network that lets people download a regular movie in one minute and an HD movie in four. I'm not going to go so far as to say it'll replace discs, but it's neat to think of a pipe that big.

I've heard it said that when they designed the interstate highway system, they never thought of 7-11's. Similarly, once we have a big network of fat pipes everywhere, new sorts of applications we never dreamed of are going to come popping up.

Scott: You never know, Eisenhower was a genius at planning.

Sharon: He was a HoJo's guy.

Scott: And with our first and last reference to that great chain of oddly-colored roadside restaurants...Sharon, thank you. Very much. You made this week go very well.

Sharon: Scott...you're welcome.