CES 2012: Remembering the real world

With the constant bombardment of new tech toys that journalists, buyers and other industry people are subjected to at CES (and no, I'm not complaining, exactly -- but it can be overwhelming, even to the most jaded professional), we can sometimes forget that we aren't everyone. Pushed to look at the thinnest laptops, the smallest routers, the largest 3D TVs, the fastest smartphones, etc. etc., we forgot that a lot of the people whom the technology is actually meant for are just looking for something that works.

I was reminded of this yesterday, when I fell into conversation with a couple -- a husband and wife -- on a bus going to the Las Vegas Convention Center. They owned a white box company that put together systems for small- and medium-sized businesses in the San Francisco area and, according to them, were doing quite well. "Many smaller businesses look automatically toward consumer vendors and find that the machines don't work for them and don't last," said the man. He said that he was successfully providing equipment and service to quite a few companies -- some with several hundred employees -- on a local level. Read more...