The Engadget Interview: Bill Gates (again!)
CES wasn't only about crazy gadget news and booth tours - we also scored a second chance to sit down withour new best friend Bill Gates and ask him all about the big announcements he made during his keynote last Wednesday.Read on to find …
Context & Ripple Effects
Microsoft front-loaded this year's Consumer Electronics Show with a media alert on January 2 promising major announcements, then streamed the keynote live on the web before Gates delivered it in person — his tenth consecutive time opening the show. The 2006 edition drew its largest exhibitor and crowd count on record, even as a longtime CES press veteran publicly complained about how the show treats media and exhibitors.
Against that backdrop, Engadget landing a second sit-down with Gates matters less for what he says than for who gets the access: a two-year-old gadget blog conducting repeat one-on-one interviews with the world's richest man immediately after his keynote signals where consumer-tech coverage is migrating.
First-order effects
- Gates leaves Las Vegas with a direct channel to Enadget's readership to elaborate on his keynote announcements, unfiltered by traditional press editing.
- The interview extends the messaging arc Microsoft began with its January 2 media alert and January 4 webcast, keeping the keynote narrative in circulation through the show's closing days.
Second-order effects
- Rival consumer-electronics players competing for the same CES spotlight face a press environment where a blog can secure repeat access to Microsoft's chairman, raising the bar for whom they grant interviews.
- With Gates having said in November 2005 that the console war's winner won't be settled until 2007 as Xbox 360 sales continue, any keynote-adjacent commentary feeds directly into the console narrative Sony and Nintendo must answer at their own events.
Third-order effects
- If blog outlets keep converting keynote access into franchise interviews, executive communications strategy shifts from embargoed briefings with legacy desks to cultivating a handful of high-reach independent voices — a structural change in who sets the tech news agenda.
The trend: Consumer-tech agenda-setting is consolidating around annual CEO keynotes amplified by a new generation of blog press, displacing traditional trade coverage as the primary amplifier.