This curator was admittedly daunted by the prospect of taking the Life-Changing Products exhibit to Santa Clara, California — and not just because of the logistics involved in shipping everything to the other side of the country. No, several products on the exhibit were developed within miles of the Santa Clara convention center where the event took place. What if executives from Google, Apple, Gate Labs, Beddit, and June attended and asked hard questions?
Well, as it turns out, curious executives from those companies did attend the show and visit the exhibit. But thankfully they didn’t engage the curator in deep engineering or code discussions. They were most interested in seeing and trying out the new products in the exhibit, some of them prototypes crowd-funded on the Internet that aren’t yet available for sale.
Another highlight of the show was an appearance on New Tang Dynasty television. Anchor Ted Lin took deep interest in each products. He spent the better part of an hour filming the products in action, including an LED bulb from Sony that plays music from a smartphone. Lin was greeted by Moorebot, a personal robot developed in China, who declared, “I’m happy to be in California today.”
The Exhibit figured prominently in advertising for the re-branded show. Mike Spanton of World Class Shows changed the name of the event from South Bay Home Show to take advantage of the Silicon Valley location. He brought me in to emphasize the show’s new high-tech emphasis. In another first, the Exhibit featured in commercials run on local television. Let’s see if we can load the ad onto the page. Voila!