Apple today announced that this year is the last year the company will exhibit at Macworld Expo. Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, will deliver the opening keynote for this year’s Macworld Conference & Expo, and it will be Apple’s last keynote at the show. The keynote address will be held at Moscone West on Tuesday, January 6, 2009 at 9:00 a.m. Macworld will be held at San Francisco’s Moscone Center January 5-9, 2009.
MacDailyNews Take: IDG World Expo, the producer of Macworld Conference & Expo, is hating life right about now.
Apple’s press release stated, verbatim:
Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers. The increasing popularity of Apple’s Retail Stores, which more than 3.5 million people visit every week, and the Apple.com website enable Apple to directly reach more than a hundred million customers around the world in innovative new ways.
Apple has been steadily scaling back on trade shows in recent years, including NAB, Macworld New York, Macworld Tokyo and Apple Expo in Paris.
Source: Apple Inc.
MacDailyNews Take: The end of a rather remarkable era (excluding Amelio). A moment of silence, please…
Thank you.
Now, judging by recent history, special “media events” and WWDC will suffice quite nicely for product unveilings. We assume Jobs will continue to deliver presentations at such events.
That said, the communal nature (Macworld Expo was Mac users’ Mecca) and workshops for non-devs will be missed; predawn alarms to go line up for hours before Steve Jobs’ keynotes, not so much.
Our condolences to those who bought Macworld Expo tickets mainly in anticipation of a keynote by Steve Jobs and, of course, those who never attended a Jobs Macworld Expo keynote live.
Cue the “Jobs is dying” articles in 3, 2, 1…
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