Gadget Show Live: Where was everyone?

If you headed to the Birmingham NEC for The Gadget Show Live in the hope of getting some pointers on broadband, the chances are you would've come away disappointed, writes Broadband Genie editor Chris Marling.

It was a very odd event, all told – as if someone had gone and plucked a couple of companies out of each niche for some kind of gadget-filled nerdy Noah's Ark. Broadband was represented by 3 and Be; the high street by PC World and Gamestation; routers by Linksys and Edimax; and Brompton and Mezzo for bicycles... I kid you not: you had more chance of buying a torch, skateboard or vacuum cleaner than you did of getting the latest speedy broadband connection.

While I'm not a fan, the biggest gadget of recent years is without doubt Apple's iPhone. Was Apple there? No. Were O2 or Carphone Warehouse – the only UK stockists of the iPhone – in attendance? Nowhere to be found. The story was equally grim for broadband.

It was great to see Be Broadband on show, keen to plug its online gaming credentials, but where was the competition? Virgin Media, Sky and BT were all strangely absent from a show that boasted a wealth of phone, television and gaming technology. And while Carphone's Geek Squad was in attendance, Carphone wasn't – nor was Talk Talk. That said, if you wanted a torch or some power tools – or to join the Air force – you were in luck.

Everyone seemed surprised too. The lads on the Geek Squad stand said a large proportion of their gadget related calls were broadband related, and they couldn't believe there weren't more ISPs on show. There was the same bemusement from the manufacturers, as everyone from games developers to hardware specialists scratched their heads: where were the ISPs?

It was the same for mobile broadband: the dongle is one of the biggest selling gadgets out there, but the only one you could get at the NEC was 3's effort: the cheapest and best-selling on the market maybe, but hardly cutting edge.

In short, the rest of the ISPs missed a trick. It was estimated 30,000 people attended – the event was sold out. And these were gadget people: they were there to spend their hard-earned on good tech. It beggars belief that the likes of Orange and PlusNet didn't see this as a great opportunity to reach out to customers. And to buy a new torch.

There was some eye-catching stuff on show though, if you looked closely enough between row upon row of headphones and speaker systems (and the occasional coffee maker). There was a Grand Prix simulator, loads of nice cutting edge Alienware PCs and some rather less cutting edge old games consoles: 

And not to forget the UK's first touchscreen interactive tabletop (from Epson), and, erm, a girl on a motorbike...