So I was just at MEDC in Seoul and also happened to attend the Solutions and Contents Exhibition of Korea, which was happening around the same time and in the same building.

MEDC Korea: The presentations were all in Korean, so I didn't really understand them, but I was pretty impressed by the overall enthusiasm of the crowd - and even more so by the fact that 90% of them seemed to be students - I think most schools started their summer break just a few days before. There were a host of kids clustered around XBox kiosks and a ton checking out OEM booths and all the different Microsoft presentations - conferences in the US are often so expensive to attend that you don't really see too many students, but that's the age group that's most enthusiastic about new technology and cool gadgets. So I thought it was pretty great that MEDC Korea was open to everyone.

SEK 2006 - This is considered one of the largest technology fairs in Korea, and it was pretty darned spectacular. The event was opened by an android (the rather spectacular EveR1, developed by the Korean Institute for Industrial Technology) and there must have been a couple of hundred companies showing off their newest toys. Microsoft had a nice large section of the room too, with a crowd of people checking out the newest Vista and Office12 features. There's not very many small startup-type companies in Korea so most of the names there were pretty big - Samsung, HP, Dell, LG - with huge gorgeous glitzy displays. But there were a bunch of small university-funded research groups with crazy little robots and stuff like that, and these were also fun to check out.

I forgot to take my camera OR my phone along with me (my phone didn't work in Korea - there's only CDMA networks there), which was a pity, but oh well...

More later,

Ritu