sitting on the floor at SIGGRAPH

So I’m sitting on the floor near the Emerging Technologies booth at SIGGRAPH, wirelessly connected to the web. Getting wireless working takes a little perseverance, there are plenty of hotspots set up but something, perhaps sunspots or people with Intel laptops or cars with loud stereos, tend to send network connections askew. The most amazing thing about wireless tehcnology is that people are willing to put up with such low reliability with these things — rather than admit that wired connections are simply a better way to live.

If I were astute I would try to make an analogy between the foibles of wireless technology and the spectacle of SIGGRAPH. Okay, well clearly wireless technology is in transition, something that needs to move to a higher density in order to be satisfying. But a higher density wireless network is going to require a denser infrastructure, which means that many more wireless repeaters plugged into the wall.
SIGGRAPH too is in transition, slightly (say 20%) diminished from its peak a few years ago. There are still as many people attending the exhibition, but the number and scale of the exhibitors has decreased, and so there is something of an increased density of warm bodies, the same number but in a smaller space. Which is what tends to happen around wireless hotspots – lots of laptops in a small area.
Well, this isn’t a particularly inspiring analogy, so I think I’ll leave it at that.