Penton pointed out that while 140 dot-coms went bust last year, that's out of a pool of 17,000 that were funded in 1999. One of the differences in this show is the lack of new faces. The ones he has seen are much more low-key. Now, the concern is profitability. However, lead manager of Microsoft product Angus Norton, who was showing off elements of the company's upcoming .Net technology to a sizable crowd, thinks trade shows in general are suffering, independent of the economy.
People can get their information from other places now.
To take half a day to come to a show isn't a good use of their time. He also admits the Internet isn't quite as hot a property. One CEO with a lot of gold is Meg Whitman of eBay. The auction house is doing just fine, thank you, she reported in her keynote speech. Obviously we don't think the Internet is dead.