Well, five days of Comic-Con is over with and I have come away with some impressions about Comic-Con as a personal computer technology venue. Comic-Con is becoming a "Movie-Con" geared towards younger fans who are there to see celebrities. I don't think that personal computer oriented companies will find Comic-Con a good venue for their products. Consoles and console games will do better but even they may find Comic-Con less of a venue for themselves too.
Comic-Con started off as a comic book convention. Comic books have become a very influential medium that other industries have tapped into. Two industries that have really profited recently have been television and movies. Movies and television shows that are based on comic books and their characters have been very profitable. Batman, Superman, Spider-Man and the X-Men are just many of the examples of characters that have been used to great dramatic and profitable effect. Movie and television studios have figured out that many of the fans that drive the demand for these movies and shows can be found at Comic-Con. For very little money and a short drive from Los Angeles to San Diego studios can get a very cheap publicity event that will reach thousands at one location that will reverberate way beyond the San Diego Convention Center walls. The bringing in of actors has brought in ticket buyers to Comic-Con that really aren't there for the comics. Many people are there to see their favorite actors in person even it is from fifty or two hundred rows away. The attendance at Comic-Con has swelled and tickets sell out quickly. This year when batches of tickets were sold on site people camped out at least as early as five in the morning.
Comic-Con has a panel at the end of the show that allows people to complain about or praise Comic-Con. Many of the people in attendance were self identified as fans that had been going to Comic-Con for years and were on the older side of thirty. Many weren't able or willing to camp out for tickets and just had a miserable experience in general. In all fairness, this was a group of people who were motivated enough to show up at the end of the show on Sunday to complain. But several years ago I attended this same panel and the complaint and suggestions were of a much more minor variety. What were the usual complaints a couple of years ago about long lines had morphed into comments about not coming back to Comic-Con at all during this meeting. Basically you were seeing the over thirty demographic leaving the convention. Comic-Con will no doubt be sold out next year but the people going will be a little different. They will be younger and likely not a long time attendee of the event. Their motivation to attend will also be more about seeing a celebrity than about strictly wanting to go to a convention about comic books. Well, wouldn't this be even better for personal computer based companies? Wouldn't younger people be more receptive to a more technologically driven convention? I don't think so and this is why.
One of the things that has made personal computer (PC) games different from consoles have been its users. In the past most PC users were older by virtue of the expense of the PC. A basic PC with a back and white screen that only displayed text could easily cost several thousand dollars. Games were geared to an older and more affluent crowd. Consoles on the other hand have always appealed to a younger crowd. This younger crowd are using their console for the one thing it can do well which is play games. The PC is not only a platform for people who are older but also for people who are doing things on it other than playing games. So how does this apply to Comic-Con? When the older demographic leaves Comic-Con, which I think it will, so too will be the audience that will stop at a PC product booth.
This year I went to the demonstration that was being put on by AMD. As an older PC user I could appreciate an APU that had integrated graphics in a processor. I saw a technological solution that would allow me to purchase or build a PC that would allow me to play some games in a cheap and functional multipurpose PC. The fact that this PC would not play the latest and most demanding games wasn't as much of a concern to me. I don't thing the younger crowd will really care about this type of product. When I went to the AMD demonstration it was not as busy as some of the game booths featuring gaming consoles. Yes, these gaming consoles were on the convention floor and the AMD exhibit was in a hall in a hotel across the street but I don't think that was the real issue. Last year when Intel set up an exhibit for the Atom processor for Google TV on the convention floor people quickly lost interest and kept moving. I didn't see Intel this year and I don't expect AMD to come back either.
The console area was busy but it wasn't packed like it used to be. I was easily able to get to a game station and play a game or talk to a representative for that game. People were walking by for the most part compared to earlier years when games were more of a novelty at Comic-Con. I think Consoles and console games will still be a draw at Comic-Con but less so as Hollywood takes over. I also think that this younger crowd isn't as interested in console demonstrations. There are plenty of demos and reviews and younger people are easily bored with this sort of display. This is something they can do at home so why should they spend a lot of their convention time at a console game exhibit? If console exhibits got a luke warm reception then PC hardware and software companies shouldn't even bother with doing exhibits. This year there wasn't a computer game magazine on the showroom floor and software vendors were largely ignored. People were there for the movie stars, less for the comic books and hardly interested at all about personal computer hardware or software.
I had seen a trend in the past of computer companies making appearances at Comic-Con. It appears that some computer companies thought that they could tap into the Comic-Con market the way the television and movie studios have. I think that trend of computer companies coming will be stopping as Comic-Con is changing because the demographic of the people going to Comic-Con is changing. As the reaction to computer companies and even consoles diminish these technology companies presence will diminish. Computer companies just haven't found that formula to get a real amount of buzz for their products like the television and movie studios have.
I wasn't able to get tickets during the convention for next year. I will have to try to get tickets when they are released online through Comic-Con. It will be nice if I can go next year and see if AMD comes back and if computer software and hardware will have a greater presence. But all things change and maybe next year I will not be going to Comic-Con and it will be a good thing. I will just have to find another convention that caters more to my demographic and interests. It has been a fun fourteen years going to Comic-Con but maybe it is time to try something new. Maybe some of the technology companies will come to the same conclusion.
