The week of January 7th in My Digital Life

I am at CES through Wednesday.  of this week.  After a day of dealing with our wonderful airline system, I felt lucky that I was only 90 minutes late into Las Vegas. As member of the press I made it in to see Bill Gates' last CES keynote. This is my second last Bill Gates keynotes (MVP Summit), I wonder how many he has done or will do before he transitions, in July of this year, from being a full time Microsoft employee to a board member. His keynote started  with a spoof video of his last day at Microsoft. Most of his keynote speeches have included a comedic spoof videos of current events at Microsoft. I wish we could purchase the DVD collection , most of the ones I have see have been very good. Sitting in the back of the room I was able to capture the spoof and am posting it below.

Bill Gates was really more a master of ceremonies during this keynote and most of the topics were discussed by Robby Bach and what his division was doing with a big emphasis on Windows Mobile.

There was acknowledgment of the iPhone, although quickly rebuffed by the comment that Windows Mobile outsells it and the Blackberry. Microsoft is  forecasting  to sell 20 million annual sales number by the end June, the end of their 2008 Fiscal Year.

The first set of products discussed were the MSN web site properties, Live Mail, Live Calendar, Live Events, and MSN Spaces and how they integrate with Windows Mobile. The demo was pretty lackluster and the only thing I learned was about the new Live Events (think Evite).

There is clearly a big move in the industry towards natural user interfaces, think touch and gestures. Bill Gates demoed the power of the surface platform, by customizing a snow board he was about to purchase. This has great promise although the surface is horizontal, Bill also demoed a wall based system using a prototype controller.

Robbie Bach announced that NBC Universal will use Microsoft technologies and specifically Silverlight to enhance the www.nbcolympics.com viewing experience of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.  He went on to discuss their connected entertainment strategy with 10 million Xbox Live users. They have now added ABC and NBC to their list of 35 networks and studios available on Xbox Live. British Telecom, Deutsche Telecom, and AT&T have reached their 1 millionth Microsoft Media Room IPTV/DVR user mark. British Telecom will start supporting the Xbox 360 as a set top box.  The  Zune which is  selling very well and the associated Zune social was demoed. The Sync in car entertainment system was demoed on stage using a new Lincoln MKX. Finally the Tell Me voice system was demoed.

All in all a pretty ho hum keynote but an affirmation that they feel they are on the right track...

There is a lot to see at CES, it is a real mob scene. It really helps to be part of the press.

This week: 

• CES 2008 coverage here on my blog and on pocketnow.com.
• My summary review of the tabletkiosk Sahara Slate PC i440D is up on pocketnow.com (link).
• Complete my review of Ilium Software's eWallet 6.
• Post more thoughts on the AT&T Tilt