IDF goes light

IT IS the night before Christ... err, the second day of IDF here in San Francisco and, finally, the international hacks crawl into bed, of course taking their schedule for the tera-event with them. And alas - there's no more keynotes,

But, wait, that's because they were all crammed into the first day, Mind you that Justin Rattner, Intels new CTO, described Monday's press briefings as "Day Zero" of IDF.

Same Rattner opened the event with the unveiling the "Core" architecture. In fact this is a marketing name way too easy to crack hard Core jokes on, quite unlike the fun we had with "NetBurst" which someone else labeled "NetBust". Or McMonster (aka McKinley) that we coined - and even "Sell and run" like some Intel folks internally labeled the first Celeron that came without L2 cache and therefore without performance.

An Intel PR rep confirmed to us before the show that the chipmaker intentionally straightened out the conference to offer more tech and less show. Therefore, some of the keynotes had to go. Even the most important news, the new architecure, got only half an hour in the keynotes. But then again what is to talk about when a slightly modified Yonah now makes the basis for all of Intel's microprocessors for the next three to five years?

Luckily we were able to catch most of the show events from prior IDFs, like rolling in the autonomous vehicle Sandstorm or Captain Kirk (walking in, not rolling) and explaining that he does not understand how toilets work. On board the USS Enterprise he may not have had to thanks to the transporter system, but Shatner later confirmed that back on earth he's actually bemused by the contraption.

But behind that, "let´s get serious" approach may lurk a hidden agenda. For the first time in its history of almost ten years, IDF collides with a major IT event - CeBIT. Of course you all know this is not only the biggest IT show on earth, it´s the biggest trade show of all, with more than 600.000 visitors. Had Intel given more news on the last two days of IDF, it may have been drowned in the flood of other news from CeBIT in the media. CeBIT opens Thursday, but press conferences there start Tuesday.

We hope Intel will at least put one star on stage next IDF. They missed the chance with Steve Jobs when they announced their cooperation with Apple. So now we suggest Kiefer Sutherland, playing Jack Bauer on the anti-terror TV show "24". Bauer's claim there is: "I´m federal agent Jack Bauer, and these are the longest days of my life." Reads like a claim for IDF, no? µ