I found myself with a spare day in the week due to an interesting approach to public holidays by the Netherlands. With this I decided to take a day trip over to Cologne to take in a show that previously I had always found myself unable to attend – Anga 2010.
This show is organised by the Association of German Cable Operators, and is ostensibly focused on the German market. In more recent times, it has found itself having a wider scope with visitors coming in from the wider European markets. However it certainly has kept much of its German aspects, with a heavy dose of German market STBs running MHP. The other aspect (unlike NAB, IBC and CES) is that it seems to focus on the here and now – the practical needs of current products, rather than any focus on the near or even far future. Because of this, the show was a little drab with many MHP, single and dual tuner Zappers (with USB addition of hard disks) and PVRs.There was a little more excitement in UIs, but only in demonstrating that you do not actually have to have a blue background and you can use a little 720p/1080i or even transparency – shock and horror. Innovative software solutions or nice UIs were absent in the main – and this really is not on. How many customers out there want to see a directory tree/file list with C:> at the top when browsing content from their home network,or a management screen for a device that makes Yahoo in 1996 look pretty?
The one good aspect of the trip to Anga, just like when you visit the other big conferences and exhibitions, was the meeting of colleagues and partners, old and new, building relationships and friendships. This is what makes it more than a webinair, and this made it well worth a visit.
So all in all a good way to spend my time with the fast train between Amsterdam and Cologne.
One thing though, come on now, suppliers – can you please stop with the unrelated 3D demos – it is not big and not clever to make everyone look like a dork with those spectacles on! particularly when you sell products that have nothing to do with 3D.
