CEA's latest tech show is a leisurely walk in the park, literally

After making its world debut in New York City last week, Digital Downtown -- a consumer show co-sponsored by the producers of the Las Vegas-based CES trade show -- looks like a slam-dunk to make an encore in Manhattan next year.

NEW YORK CITY (BetaNews) - Gazing around the indoor exhibit hall in Manhattan's venerable, marble-floored World Financial Center -- and the festive outdoor tents set up by Best Buy and Pioneer in the harbor-facing "Winter Garden" outside -- it was kind of hard to tell that you were in New York at all -- as opposed to Vegas, or maybe even Los Angeles or an exotic spot somewhere along the Riviera.

In the already summerish weather, consumers dressed in shorts and T-shirts, strolling casually about the Digital Downtown show last week, had both their eyes and ears treated simultaneously to the likes of Pioneer's audio-enabled concept cars, the latest gizmos from household names like Toshiba and LG, and the yachts and sailboats in the marina adjoining the garden courtyard.

It was all a very long distance, both geographically and figuratively, from the succession of June trade shows held over previous years inside the Javits Convention Center just up the street, starting with the famed PC Expo and stretching into the later C3 Expo. Like CES, those earlier events in Manhattan were geared to the trade -- specifically, to PC buyers for corporations and other large organizations.

"What we're doing, instead, is for consumers," said Eric Schwartz, president and group publisher of the Consumer Technology Publishing Group (CTPG)/NAPCO, in an interview with BetaNews at Digital Downtown. Schwartz credited Martin Porter & Associates with originating the concept behind the consumer show.

"When Martin Porter asked us if we wanted to be on board, I said, 'If you can get the CEA [Consumer Electronics Association] involved, yes,'" according to the publisher.

Will Digital Downtown resurface again next year? "Absolutely," Schwartz informed BetaNews, although using a bit more colorful language than just that.

Aside from the CEA -- the force behind CES -- and CTPG and Porter & Associates, other groups associated with the production of the new Digital Downtown show include Brookfield Properties, owners of the World Financial Center.

With the new show, the CEA appears to be grabbing hold of a golden opportunity to get new products out into the community, where end users can explore and play around with PCs and other consumer devices without the buying pressures they face in walking into consumer electronics stores.

Could the rest of the industry be learning a thing or two from Apple? Despite the tens of thousands of users who regularly pour into each and every MacWorld show, big consumer-oriented computer events have been notably -- and sadly -- sparse elsewhere.

The interest is clearly there, though, among general consumers. Even back during the 1990s, when PCs and other devices were a lot less widespread, curious passers-by used to try to gain admission to Bruno Blenheim's PC Expo -- only to be turned away, typically, because they weren't "qualified buyers."

On Thursday afternoon of last week, end users lined up in Digital Downtown's Best Buy tent to play a boxing game running on a Nintendo Wii machine, temporarily ignoring the attractions of shops, shaded park benches, and a Starbucks nearby. The consumer show continued through Saturday, and admission was free of charge for everyone.

If Digital Downtown works in New York, maybe there's even room for a spinoff series of consumer shows in other venues of the world.