I’ve been at HITEC this week in Anaheim California. The attendance is way down on last year but I guess that’s to be expected. As I wandered down the aisles looking for some inspiring new technologies and at the same time dodging the sales people who are dragging innocent bystanders onto their stands, I stopped at a stand which had more customers than most. In a bit of a daze ( because these events are quite tiring and always too hot) I suddenly twigged that there was a bizarrely dressed man standing high up on a podium with a microphone strapped to his head. He was a magician about to start his show!!! Fantastic… I love magicians!

He was brilliant. He would ask a member of the audience to pick a number between 20 and 60 or something like that, and as they figured out what half of it was, he was filling out a 4 by 4 grid out with 16 numbers. Then, when the punter was asked what her number was, he drew attention to his grid in which every line, in every direction added up to HER NUMBER! … Genius!

The crowd dispersed and I wandered off to find coffee thinking to myself “maybe we should have a magician with numbers in Acentic” (only joking Stuart). As I sat down with coffee I had a more alarming realization which was that I had  just stood on a stand for 15 enjoyable minutes but have no idea what they sold. I must review our marketing to make sure that the message is clear.