To be honest, the ONLY good things that happened to me there were stealing a mug, pen and a stress ball from Pitman and buying Windows 7 Professional…
Anyway, lemme go back with history abit…
The first INFOCONNECT I went to was back when I was 16 years old (Somewhere around 2001) and it took 3~4 halls there filled with AWESOME companies like ATi, GFI (Yes, I dropped my jaw when I first saw’em) and big companies that were actually SHOWING THEIR TECHNOLOGY not just selling shit…
Now you go there, and you’ll feel like you’re in Hawalli… But instead of having a walk down the street to find a good shop, they just crammed them in one hall while the other hall shows the government computer-gadgets and some corporate dealers…
Now, I’ll leave the government\corporate thing aside (Even though one small hall is totally unfair), I’ll just bitch about the other hall where they held the computer\mobile crap…
The first INFOCONNECT I went to was amazing that I bought my first computer book (Visual Basic 6) there, someone gave me a prototype ATi RAGE (Can’t remember the VGA card I had back then… C’mon, it was 9 years ago!) driver for Windows XP that provides initial support to OpenGL so I can play Counter-Strike v1.3 😛 and had a talk with GFi dudes which enlightened me about some security topics…
Then things started to go down the drain…
Now when you go there, you’ll find mobile phone shops (And they almost sell the same shit with a slight difference in prices), crappy computer hardware (Laptops\Desktops\Accessories) and some junk…
And the offers there aren’t that special neither that great; I bought Windows 7 Professional for 64.500KD!! I mean, 0.500KD cheaper than the market (I could’ve bought 10 Chocolate Father Stars with’em though)… THERE ISN’T A SINGLE BOOTH THAT SELLS MAC STUFF TO MAKE FUN OFF!!! No really, not to JUST make fun off, it shows how uninteresting this event is!!!
I mean, there was a HUGE difference between last year’s INFOCONNECT and this year’s INFOCONNECT… Last year’s had some Mac booth that almost convinced me that Mac OSX is more convenient for me than Windows… Then I came up with some critical questions that froze the dude I was talking with…
Literally speaking, INFOCONNECT now is nothing but Hawalli shops crammed together in a tiny hall where they sell their junk for a bit higher prices… Nothing but a shop-fest…
But truth to be said, I’m surprised that I’ve seen a Bitdefender booth there that I will end up buying something from there tomorrow morning hopefully…
If you have some good connection to the guys managed this event, please tell’em they suck…
If you went there and you still like things there, I pity you…
If you didn’t go there yet, DON’T!! You’re not missing anything (Except for the VIVA 3G mascot… That made me lol so hard)…
If you have good connection that can pull off a better event where technologies are actually shown off, PLEASE DO!!!
Windows 7 Professional for 64.500KD ……tht is too too too much…………..
What you pay is what you get
ummmmmmmm I got it for free, legally. ’cause im a student of kuniv :p
Not only that but the whole mary bunch(Win xp pro, vista, 7 pro, server 2008, other M$ stuff, … and DOS 6! WTF). But i guess that’s what they want people to do, buy their stuff at these high prices to gain moniez and give their stuff for free to me 🙂
all you needed to get your free copy is just a student no!!! WHY BUY 🙁
anyhow, Enjoy it buddy, hehehe, …
This years Infoconnect expo was my last hope of something interesting happening in kuwait, computer-wise. now that’s shot, I guess I wont be going there after all. not this year, or the next.
I think most would agree that in order to have an ‘expectable’ expo, you need a MS booth, Apple, a couple of security companies, hardware companies like AMD and nvidia, and some end-user computer sellers (and not their lame agents) like Toshiba and MSI. you can have some wireless carrier booths, but don’t over do it.
what you don’t need is crap, more crap, and even more crap. it’s a computer expo, not a crap expo. When I go there, I
expectwant to see new and fascinating technologies, suff you can’t see every day. I want to talk to representatives from big names. what I do not want is to buy stuff i can get elsewhere for less.Someone needs to do something quick before this expo gets killed. This IS the only computer-related expo we’ve got. how about a petition, or a no ‘commercial transaction’ rule to force out crap. I’d be more than happy to just look at amazing stuff then buy crap.
We can also try to start a separate expo (not us, but the people who could actually pull it off) that’s only show’n’tell.
…
Honestly the only thing I enjoyed over there was the Wataniya booth setup. It was fantastic. I think the advertising company that they hired is IMPACT & ECHO (I hope they are still with them don’t know if they have changed) but if they are; then I say these guys are pulling some serious creativity and I hope to see more in the near future.
it’s been a while since the last time i commented in here….I agree with sig but I have to say msi is not a lame agent.