#lvcc — Public Fediverse posts

So many Vegas visits, still so few for fun

Landing at Dulles Wednesday evening closed out my 45th work trip to Las Vegas. That number alone is not something to take pride in and probably constitutes evidence of some character defect, but what’s even more disturbing is that since my first trip to Vegas in 1998–for CES, of course–I have still only been there three times for fun.

This lifestyle long ago rendered me incapable of dealing with that city however normal people do. Instead, having the event formerly known as the Consumer Electronics Show dominate my experience of Vegas–I’m now at 28 trips there just for the Consumer Technology Association’s convention, still one of the most important events on my work calendar–keeps subjecting me to the place at its most expensive and least efficient.

Even smaller-scale conferences like Black Hat (with six trips so far, it’s become about as essential as CES but easier to monetize) and the NAB Show (where I moderated a panel this week, with the National Association of Broadcasters covering airfare and lodging) leave me happier to take off from LAS than to land there.

It’s not that I can’t enjoy a little time in the glitziest corner of Nevada. You can eat exceedingly well there, and Vegas service-industry folks are some of the best in the world. Blackjack can be fun, as long as you remember that you should at least try to lose slowly.

If you drive far enough off the Strip, you can see some striking natural scenery. It took CES to remind me of that last bit, in the form of an outing in 2025 to Lake Mead to experience an electric sport boat.

And there is some exceptional lodging in Vegas, although I’ve also stayed at some of the crummier ones. I started trying to inventory the hotels I’ve stayed at from the Strip up to the convention center (thus excluding off-strip properties like the Palms and a few places in downtown Las Vegas as well as two Airbnbs) and quickly realized they exceed the number of ballparks I’ve visited.

From south to north: Mandalay Bay, Luxor, Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, Monte Carlo (today Park MGM), Cosmopolitan, Hilton Grand Vacations, Bally’s (now the Horseshoe), Aladdin (now Planet Hollywood), Palms, Flamingo, Westin, Imperial Palace (the worst among the lot, fortunately now the Linq), Harrah’s, Mirage (demolished, being replaced by a Hard Rock Hotel in the shape of a guitar), Treasure Island, Wynn, Renaissance, Westgate, Fontainebleau (I’d rank that the best). 

But however nice the hotel may have been, there’s no getting around how much I dislike the auto-centric, pedestrian-hostile nature of the streets outside. Unless you can start and end a conference commute on the monorail–this week’s trip, unlike most, allowed that–you will sit in traffic.

The only improvements to Vegas transportation since 1998 have been on the margins: the monorail, Uber and Lyft liberating visitors from taxis that charge $3 extra for credit-card payment, the Vegas Loop’s tunnels, and the advent of autonomous vehicles from Zoox and, soon, Waymo.

Even walking up and down the Strip is less efficient than it should be once you enter a building, since casino floors are where readable layouts and clear signage go to die.

I grew up someplace where you had to drive everywhere; I never want to live like that again and don’t enjoy visiting places that seem intent on making that a perpetual default. I am much happier to have my travel destination be a more human-scaled city where it’s normal and enjoyable to get around by walking and transit; the contrast between CES in Vegas and MWC in Barcelona is glaring and entirely in Spain’s favor.

I think of that every time one industry-analyst friend who moved from the Bay Area to a Vegas suburb tries to sell me on the same move. My response is always some version of “there is nothing you could say to make me ever want to do that.”

And yet work keeps pulling me to Vegas anyway. This week’s trip was my third this year, with one more planned, and I already know next year will feature at least three. I should probably seek treatment for this condition at some point.

So many Vegas visits, still so few for fun

Landing at Dulles Wednesday evening closed out my 45th work trip to Las Vegas. That number alone is not something to take pride in and probably constitutes evidence of some character defect, but what’s even more disturbing is that since my first trip to Vegas in 1998–for CES, of course–I have still only been there three times for fun.

This lifestyle long ago rendered me incapable of dealing with that city however normal people do. Instead, having the event formerly known as the Consumer Electronics Show dominate my experience of Vegas–I’m now at 28 trips there just for the Consumer Technology Association’s convention, still one of the most important events on my work calendar–keeps subjecting me to the place at its most expensive and least efficient.

Even smaller-scale conferences like Black Hat (with six trips so far, it’s become about as essential as CES but easier to monetize) and the NAB Show (where I moderated a panel this week, with the National Association of Broadcasters covering airfare and lodging) leave me happier to take off from LAS than to land there.

It’s not that I can’t enjoy a little time in the glitziest corner of Nevada. You can eat exceedingly well there, and Vegas service-industry folks are some of the best in the world. Blackjack can be fun, as long as you remember that you should at least try to lose slowly.

If you drive far enough off the Strip, you can see some striking natural scenery. It took CES to remind me of that last bit, in the form of an outing in 2025 to Lake Mead to experience an electric sport boat.

And there is some exceptional lodging in Vegas, although I’ve also stayed at some of the crummier ones. I started trying to inventory the hotels I’ve stayed at from the Strip up to the convention center (thus excluding off-strip properties like the Palms and a few places in downtown Las Vegas as well as two Airbnbs) and quickly realized they exceed the number of ballparks I’ve visited.

From south to north: Mandalay Bay, Luxor, Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, Monte Carlo (today Park MGM), Cosmopolitan, Hilton Grand Vacations, Bally’s (now the Horseshoe), Aladdin (now Planet Hollywood), Palms, Flamingo, Westin, Imperial Palace (the worst among the lot, fortunately now the Linq), Harrah’s, Mirage (demolished, being replaced by a Hard Rock Hotel in the shape of a guitar), Treasure Island, Wynn, Renaissance, Westgate, Fontainebleau (I’d rank that the best). 

But however nice the hotel may have been, there’s no getting around how much I dislike the auto-centric, pedestrian-hostile nature of the streets outside. Unless you can start and end a conference commute on the monorail–this week’s trip, unlike most, allowed that–you will sit in traffic.

The only improvements to Vegas transportation since 1998 have been on the margins: the monorail, Uber and Lyft liberating visitors from taxis that charge $3 extra for credit-card payment, the Vegas Loop’s tunnels, and the advent of autonomous vehicles from Zoox and, soon, Waymo.

Even walking up and down the Strip is less efficient than it should be once you enter a building, since casino floors are where readable layouts and clear signage go to die.

I grew up someplace where you had to drive everywhere; I never want to live like that again and don’t enjoy visiting places that seem intent on making that a perpetual default. I am much happier to have my travel destination be a more human-scaled city where it’s normal and enjoyable to get around by walking and transit; the contrast between CES in Vegas and MWC in Barcelona is glaring and entirely in Spain’s favor.

I think of that every time one industry-analyst friend who moved from the Bay Area to a Vegas suburb tries to sell me on the same move. My response is always some version of “there is nothing you could say to make me ever want to do that.”

And yet work keeps pulling me to Vegas anyway. This week’s trip was my third this year, with one more planned, and I already know next year will feature at least three. I should probably seek treatment for this condition at some point.

So many Vegas visits, still so few for fun

Landing at Dulles Wednesday evening closed out my 45th work trip to Las Vegas. That number alone is not something to take pride in and probably constitutes evidence of some character defect, but what’s even more disturbing is that since my first trip to Vegas in 1998–for CES, of course–I have still only been there three times for fun.

This lifestyle long ago rendered me incapable of dealing with that city however normal people do. Instead, having the event formerly known as the Consumer Electronics Show dominate my experience of Vegas–I’m now at 28 trips there just for the Consumer Technology Association’s convention, still one of the most important events on my work calendar–keeps subjecting me to the place at its most expensive and least efficient.

Even smaller-scale conferences like Black Hat (with six trips so far, it’s become about as essential as CES but easier to monetize) and the NAB Show (where I moderated a panel this week, with the National Association of Broadcasters covering airfare and lodging) leave me happier to take off from LAS than to land there.

It’s not that I can’t enjoy a little time in the glitziest corner of Nevada. You can eat exceedingly well there, and Vegas service-industry folks are some of the best in the world. Blackjack can be fun, as long as you remember that you should at least try to lose slowly.

If you drive far enough off the Strip, you can see some striking natural scenery. It took CES to remind me of that last bit, in the form of an outing in 2025 to Lake Mead to experience an electric sport boat.

And there is some exceptional lodging in Vegas, although I’ve also stayed at some of the crummier ones. I started trying to inventory the hotels I’ve stayed at from the Strip up to the convention center (thus excluding off-strip properties like the Palms and a few places in downtown Las Vegas as well as two Airbnbs) and quickly realized they exceed the number of ballparks I’ve visited.

From south to north: Mandalay Bay, Luxor, Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, Monte Carlo (today Park MGM), Cosmopolitan, Hilton Grand Vacations, Bally’s (now the Horseshoe), Aladdin (now Planet Hollywood), Palms, Flamingo, Westin, Imperial Palace (the worst among the lot, fortunately now the Linq), Harrah’s, Mirage (demolished, being replaced by a Hard Rock Hotel in the shape of a guitar), Treasure Island, Wynn, Renaissance, Westgate, Fontainebleau (I’d rank that the best). 

But however nice the hotel may have been, there’s no getting around how much I dislike the auto-centric, pedestrian-hostile nature of the streets outside. Unless you can start and end a conference commute on the monorail–this week’s trip, unlike most, allowed that–you will sit in traffic.

The only improvements to Vegas transportation since 1998 have been on the margins: the monorail, Uber and Lyft liberating visitors from taxis that charge $3 extra for credit-card payment, the Vegas Loop’s tunnels, and the advent of autonomous vehicles from Zoox and, soon, Waymo.

Even walking up and down the Strip is less efficient than it should be once you enter a building, since casino floors are where readable layouts and clear signage go to die.

I grew up someplace where you had to drive everywhere; I never want to live like that again and don’t enjoy visiting places that seem intent on making that a perpetual default. I am much happier to have my travel destination be a more human-scaled city where it’s normal and enjoyable to get around by walking and transit; the contrast between CES in Vegas and MWC in Barcelona is glaring and entirely in Spain’s favor.

I think of that every time one industry-analyst friend who moved from the Bay Area to a Vegas suburb tries to sell me on the same move. My response is always some version of “there is nothing you could say to make me ever want to do that.”

And yet work keeps pulling me to Vegas anyway. This week’s trip was my third this year, with one more planned, and I already know next year will feature at least three. I should probably seek treatment for this condition at some point.

So many Vegas visits, still so few for fun

Landing at Dulles Wednesday evening closed out my 45th work trip to Las Vegas. That number alone is not something to take pride in and probably constitutes evidence of some character defect, but what’s even more disturbing is that since my first trip to Vegas in 1998–for CES, of course–I have still only been there three times for fun.

This lifestyle long ago rendered me incapable of dealing with that city however normal people do. Instead, having the event formerly known as the Consumer Electronics Show dominate my experience of Vegas–I’m now at 28 trips there just for the Consumer Technology Association’s convention, still one of the most important events on my work calendar–keeps subjecting me to the place at its most expensive and least efficient.

Even smaller-scale conferences like Black Hat (with six trips so far, it’s become about as essential as CES but easier to monetize) and the NAB Show (where I moderated a panel this week, with the National Association of Broadcasters covering airfare and lodging) leave me happier to take off from LAS than to land there.

It’s not that I can’t enjoy a little time in the glitziest corner of Nevada. You can eat exceedingly well there, and Vegas service-industry folks are some of the best in the world. Blackjack can be fun, as long as you remember that you should at least try to lose slowly.

If you drive far enough off the Strip, you can see some striking natural scenery. It took CES to remind me of that last bit, in the form of an outing in 2025 to Lake Mead to experience an electric sport boat.

And there is some exceptional lodging in Vegas, although I’ve also stayed at some of the crummier ones. I started trying to inventory the hotels I’ve stayed at from the Strip up to the convention center (thus excluding off-strip properties like the Palms and a few places in downtown Las Vegas as well as two Airbnbs) and quickly realized they exceed the number of ballparks I’ve visited.

From south to north: Mandalay Bay, Luxor, Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, Monte Carlo (today Park MGM), Cosmopolitan, Hilton Grand Vacations, Bally’s (now the Horseshoe), Aladdin (now Planet Hollywood), Palms, Flamingo, Westin, Imperial Palace (the worst among the lot, fortunately now the Linq), Harrah’s, Mirage (demolished, being replaced by a Hard Rock Hotel in the shape of a guitar), Treasure Island, Wynn, Renaissance, Westgate, Fontainebleau (I’d rank that the best). 

But however nice the hotel may have been, there’s no getting around how much I dislike the auto-centric, pedestrian-hostile nature of the streets outside. Unless you can start and end a conference commute on the monorail–this week’s trip, unlike most, allowed that–you will sit in traffic.

The only improvements to Vegas transportation since 1998 have been on the margins: the monorail, Uber and Lyft liberating visitors from taxis that charge $3 extra for credit-card payment, the Vegas Loop’s tunnels, and the advent of autonomous vehicles from Zoox and, soon, Waymo.

Even walking up and down the Strip is less efficient than it should be once you enter a building, since casino floors are where readable layouts and clear signage go to die.

I grew up someplace where you had to drive everywhere; I never want to live like that again and don’t enjoy visiting places that seem intent on making that a perpetual default. I am much happier to have my travel destination be a more human-scaled city where it’s normal and enjoyable to get around by walking and transit; the contrast between CES in Vegas and MWC in Barcelona is glaring and entirely in Spain’s favor.

I think of that every time one industry-analyst friend who moved from the Bay Area to a Vegas suburb tries to sell me on the same move. My response is always some version of “there is nothing you could say to make me ever want to do that.”

And yet work keeps pulling me to Vegas anyway. This week’s trip was my third this year, with one more planned, and I already know next year will feature at least three. I should probably seek treatment for this condition at some point.

Weekly output: Internet Archive, Roblox parental controls, Google travel-search tools, T-Mobile yanks free WiFi from United flights, Mark Vena podcast, talking to local user groups, AST SpaceMobile

LAS VEGAS–I’m typing this from a press room in the Las Vegas Convention Center barely three months after I spent too much time in that facility for CES. Credit or blame for this trip goes to a different Washington-area trade group, the National Association of Broadcasters. Tuesday, I will be moderating an NAB Show panel about the state of content creation that features two people who are better at Instagram than me: Juliana Broste and my fellow former USA Today columnist Jefferson Graham.

4/13/2026: Journalists Applaud the Internet Archive’s Role In Preserving the Public Record, Fight for the Future

A staffer with Public Knowledge e-mailed me a few weeks ago to ask if I would be willing to sign a letter supporting the Internet Archive’s efforts to preserve the history of the Web and possibly provide a quote about how I’d used the Archive. Having repeatedly relied on the Archive’s Wayback Machine to link back to my own past published work, I said I would be happy to do that–having already donated $100 to that San Francisco non-profit in January.

4/13/2026: Roblox Adds Account Restrictions for Younger Users, Expands Age Verification, PCMag

I attended a press roundtable Monday morning featuring some Roblox trust-and-safety executives, allowing me to enrich this writeup of the platform’s changes with quotes from that conversation.

4/15/2026: T-Mobile Grounds Free In-Flight Wi-Fi Benefit for United Airlines Passengers, PCMag

I had the dumb luck to see this change firsthand on a flight from Denver to San Jose Tuesday, then needed the rest of that day to get some responses from T-Mobile and United. The airline’s switch to free Starlink connectivity will fix this problem, but we are months away from that rollout reaching a significant fraction of United’s mainline fleet.

4/17/2026: Like It or Not, Google Wants to Be Your AI Travel Buddy This Summer, PCMag

I wrote up this post off an embargoed copy of Google’s announcement that we had to correct the next day because I had missed two of the finer points of this bundle of news. In my halfhearted defense, it is more work than you might realize keeping track of Google’s ongoing efforts to infuse AI into its existing services.

4/17/2026: How NTT Research’s Upgrade 2026 Helps Silicon Valley Get Ready for The Future, Mark Vena

My industry-analyst pal had do a quick video from NTT Research’s Upgrade conference in San Jose, Calif.–with that firm covering my travel costs–about some of its initiatives.

4/18/2026: 2026 Consumer Electronics Show and Lots More!, Potomac Area Technology and Computer Society/Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Personal Computer User Group/Washington Apple Pi

Despite that title–picked by the organizers at PATACS, pronounced “Pat-Aces”–I spent more time talking about other topics. Among them: my switch from Evernote to Obsidian just in time for CES, the sad state of tech policy in Washington, and my takes on self-driving cars and what’s befallen the Washington Post. As I have in previous appearances before these folks, I showed up with a bag of trade-show swag and gave away all of it.

4/19/2026: Blue Origin Rocket Launches, Then Loses AST SpaceMobile BlueBird Satellite, PCMag

I watched the third launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket on my phone as I was walking up to the security checkpoint at Dulles early Sunday morning, started writing up what I thought was a successful launch, then learned–via painfully slow inflight WiFi–that New Glenn’s second stage had failed to deliver AST’s mobile-broadband BlueBird satellite to the intended orbit. This is a real black eye for Blue that should outweigh its achievement in reflying a New Glenn booster and then landing it on a barge in the Atlantic.

Weekly output: Internet Archive, Roblox parental controls, Google travel-search tools, T-Mobile yanks free WiFi from United flights, Mark Vena podcast, talking to local user groups, AST SpaceMobile

LAS VEGAS–I’m typing this from a press room in the Las Vegas Convention Center barely three months after I spent too much time in that facility for CES. Credit or blame for this trip goes to a different Washington-area trade group, the National Association of Broadcasters. Tuesday, I will be moderating an NAB Show panel about the state of content creation that features two people who are better at Instagram than me: Juliana Broste and my fellow former USA Today columnist Jefferson Graham.

4/13/2026: Journalists Applaud the Internet Archive’s Role In Preserving the Public Record, Fight for the Future

A staffer with Public Knowledge e-mailed me a few weeks ago to ask if I would be willing to sign a letter supporting the Internet Archive’s efforts to preserve the history of the Web and possibly provide a quote about how I’d used the Archive. Having repeatedly relied on the Archive’s Wayback Machine to link back to my own past published work, I said I would be happy to do that–having already donated $100 to that San Francisco non-profit in January.

4/13/2026: Roblox Adds Account Restrictions for Younger Users, Expands Age Verification, PCMag

I attended a press roundtable Monday morning featuring some Roblox trust-and-safety executives, allowing me to enrich this writeup of the platform’s changes with quotes from that conversation.

4/15/2026: T-Mobile Grounds Free In-Flight Wi-Fi Benefit for United Airlines Passengers, PCMag

I had the dumb luck to see this change firsthand on a flight from Denver to San Jose Tuesday, then needed the rest of that day to get some responses from T-Mobile and United. The airline’s switch to free Starlink connectivity will fix this problem, but we are months away from that rollout reaching a significant fraction of United’s mainline fleet.

4/17/2026: Like It or Not, Google Wants to Be Your AI Travel Buddy This Summer, PCMag

I wrote up this post off an embargoed copy of Google’s announcement that we had to correct the next day because I had missed two of the finer points of this bundle of news. In my halfhearted defense, it is more work than you might realize keeping track of Google’s ongoing efforts to infuse AI into its existing services.

4/17/2026: How NTT Research’s Upgrade 2026 Helps Silicon Valley Get Ready for The Future, Mark Vena

My industry-analyst pal had do a quick video from NTT Research’s Upgrade conference in San Jose, Calif.–with that firm covering my travel costs–about some of its initiatives.

4/18/2026: 2026 Consumer Electronics Show and Lots More!, Potomac Area Technology and Computer Society/Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Personal Computer User Group/Washington Apple Pi

Despite that title–picked by the organizers at PATACS, pronounced “Pat-Aces”–I spent more time talking about other topics. Among them: my switch from Evernote to Obsidian just in time for CES, the sad state of tech policy in Washington, and my takes on self-driving cars and what’s befallen the Washington Post. As I have in previous appearances before these folks, I showed up with a bag of trade-show swag and gave away all of it.

4/19/2026: Blue Origin Rocket Launches, Then Loses AST SpaceMobile BlueBird Satellite, PCMag

I watched the third launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket on my phone as I was walking up to the security checkpoint at Dulles early Sunday morning, started writing up what I thought was a successful launch, then learned–via painfully slow inflight WiFi–that New Glenn’s second stage had failed to deliver AST’s mobile-broadband BlueBird satellite to the intended orbit. This is a real black eye for Blue that should outweigh its achievement in reflying a New Glenn booster and then landing it on a barge in the Atlantic.

Weekly output: Internet Archive, Roblox parental controls, Google travel-search tools, T-Mobile yanks free WiFi from United flights, Mark Vena podcast, talking to local user groups, AST SpaceMobile

LAS VEGAS–I’m typing this from a press room in the Las Vegas Convention Center barely three months after I spent too much time in that facility for CES. Credit or blame for this trip goes to a different Washington-area trade group, the National Association of Broadcasters. Tuesday, I will be moderating an NAB Show panel about the state of content creation that features two people who are better at Instagram than me: Juliana Broste and my fellow former USA Today columnist Jefferson Graham.

4/13/2026: Journalists Applaud the Internet Archive’s Role In Preserving the Public Record, Fight for the Future

A staffer with Public Knowledge e-mailed me a few weeks ago to ask if I would be willing to sign a letter supporting the Internet Archive’s efforts to preserve the history of the Web and possibly provide a quote about how I’d used the Archive. Having repeatedly relied on the Archive’s Wayback Machine to link back to my own past published work, I said I would be happy to do that–having already donated $100 to that San Francisco non-profit in January.

4/13/2026: Roblox Adds Account Restrictions for Younger Users, Expands Age Verification, PCMag

I attended a press roundtable Monday morning featuring some Roblox trust-and-safety executives, allowing me to enrich this writeup of the platform’s changes with quotes from that conversation.

4/15/2026: T-Mobile Grounds Free In-Flight Wi-Fi Benefit for United Airlines Passengers, PCMag

I had the dumb luck to see this change firsthand on a flight from Denver to San Jose Tuesday, then needed the rest of that day to get some responses from T-Mobile and United. The airline’s switch to free Starlink connectivity will fix this problem, but we are months away from that rollout reaching a significant fraction of United’s mainline fleet.

4/17/2026: Like It or Not, Google Wants to Be Your AI Travel Buddy This Summer, PCMag

I wrote up this post off an embargoed copy of Google’s announcement that we had to correct the next day because I had missed two of the finer points of this bundle of news. In my halfhearted defense, it is more work than you might realize keeping track of Google’s ongoing efforts to infuse AI into its existing services.

4/17/2026: How NTT Research’s Upgrade 2026 Helps Silicon Valley Get Ready for The Future, Mark Vena

My industry-analyst pal had do a quick video from NTT Research’s Upgrade conference in San Jose, Calif.–with that firm covering my travel costs–about some of its initiatives.

4/18/2026: 2026 Consumer Electronics Show and Lots More!, Potomac Area Technology and Computer Society/Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Personal Computer User Group/Washington Apple Pi

Despite that title–picked by the organizers at PATACS, pronounced “Pat-Aces”–I spent more time talking about other topics. Among them: my switch from Evernote to Obsidian just in time for CES, the sad state of tech policy in Washington, and my takes on self-driving cars and what’s befallen the Washington Post. As I have in previous appearances before these folks, I showed up with a bag of trade-show swag and gave away all of it.

4/19/2026: Blue Origin Rocket Launches, Then Loses AST SpaceMobile BlueBird Satellite, PCMag

I watched the third launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket on my phone as I was walking up to the security checkpoint at Dulles early Sunday morning, started writing up what I thought was a successful launch, then learned–via painfully slow inflight WiFi–that New Glenn’s second stage had failed to deliver AST’s mobile-broadband BlueBird satellite to the intended orbit. This is a real black eye for Blue that should outweigh its achievement in reflying a New Glenn booster and then landing it on a barge in the Atlantic.

Weekly output: Internet Archive, Roblox parental controls, Google travel-search tools, T-Mobile yanks free WiFi from United flights, Mark Vena podcast, talking to local user groups, AST SpaceMobile

LAS VEGAS–I’m typing this from a press room in the Las Vegas Convention Center barely three months after I spent too much time in that facility for CES. Credit or blame for this trip goes to a different Washington-area trade group, the National Association of Broadcasters. Tuesday, I will be moderating an NAB Show panel about the state of content creation that features two people who are better at Instagram than me: Juliana Broste and my fellow former USA Today columnist Jefferson Graham.

4/13/2026: Journalists Applaud the Internet Archive’s Role In Preserving the Public Record, Fight for the Future

A staffer with Public Knowledge e-mailed me a few weeks ago to ask if I would be willing to sign a letter supporting the Internet Archive’s efforts to preserve the history of the Web and possibly provide a quote about how I’d used the Archive. Having repeatedly relied on the Archive’s Wayback Machine to link back to my own past published work, I said I would be happy to do that–having already donated $100 to that San Francisco non-profit in January.

4/13/2026: Roblox Adds Account Restrictions for Younger Users, Expands Age Verification, PCMag

I attended a press roundtable Monday morning featuring some Roblox trust-and-safety executives, allowing me to enrich this writeup of the platform’s changes with quotes from that conversation.

4/15/2026: T-Mobile Grounds Free In-Flight Wi-Fi Benefit for United Airlines Passengers, PCMag

I had the dumb luck to see this change firsthand on a flight from Denver to San Jose Tuesday, then needed the rest of that day to get some responses from T-Mobile and United. The airline’s switch to free Starlink connectivity will fix this problem, but we are months away from that rollout reaching a significant fraction of United’s mainline fleet.

4/17/2026: Like It or Not, Google Wants to Be Your AI Travel Buddy This Summer, PCMag

I wrote up this post off an embargoed copy of Google’s announcement that we had to correct the next day because I had missed two of the finer points of this bundle of news. In my halfhearted defense, it is more work than you might realize keeping track of Google’s ongoing efforts to infuse AI into its existing services.

4/17/2026: How NTT Research’s Upgrade 2026 Helps Silicon Valley Get Ready for The Future, Mark Vena

My industry-analyst pal had do a quick video from NTT Research’s Upgrade conference in San Jose, Calif.–with that firm covering my travel costs–about some of its initiatives.

4/18/2026: 2026 Consumer Electronics Show and Lots More!, Potomac Area Technology and Computer Society/Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Personal Computer User Group/Washington Apple Pi

Despite that title–picked by the organizers at PATACS, pronounced “Pat-Aces”–I spent more time talking about other topics. Among them: my switch from Evernote to Obsidian just in time for CES, the sad state of tech policy in Washington, and my takes on self-driving cars and what’s befallen the Washington Post. As I have in previous appearances before these folks, I showed up with a bag of trade-show swag and gave away all of it.

4/19/2026: Blue Origin Rocket Launches, Then Loses AST SpaceMobile BlueBird Satellite, PCMag

I watched the third launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket on my phone as I was walking up to the security checkpoint at Dulles early Sunday morning, started writing up what I thought was a successful launch, then learned–via painfully slow inflight WiFi–that New Glenn’s second stage had failed to deliver AST’s mobile-broadband BlueBird satellite to the intended orbit. This is a real black eye for Blue that should outweigh its achievement in reflying a New Glenn booster and then landing it on a barge in the Atlantic.

Weekly output: Internet Archive, Roblox parental controls, Google travel-search tools, T-Mobile yanks free WiFi from United flights, Mark Vena podcast, talking to local user groups, AST SpaceMobile

LAS VEGAS–I’m typing this from a press room in the Las Vegas Convention Center barely three months after I spent too much time in that facility for CES. Credit or blame for this trip goes to a different Washington-area trade group, the National Association of Broadcasters. Tuesday, I will be moderating an NAB Show panel about the state of content creation that features two people who are better at Instagram than me: Juliana Broste and my fellow former USA Today columnist Jefferson Graham.

4/13/2026: Journalists Applaud the Internet Archive’s Role In Preserving the Public Record, Fight for the Future

A staffer with Public Knowledge e-mailed me a few weeks ago to ask if I would be willing to sign a letter supporting the Internet Archive’s efforts to preserve the history of the Web and possibly provide a quote about how I’d used the Archive. Having repeatedly relied on the Archive’s Wayback Machine to link back to my own past published work, I said I would be happy to do that–having already donated $100 to that San Francisco non-profit in January.

4/13/2026: Roblox Adds Account Restrictions for Younger Users, Expands Age Verification, PCMag

I attended a press roundtable Monday morning featuring some Roblox trust-and-safety executives, allowing me to enrich this writeup of the platform’s changes with quotes from that conversation.

4/15/2026: T-Mobile Grounds Free In-Flight Wi-Fi Benefit for United Airlines Passengers, PCMag

I had the dumb luck to see this change firsthand on a flight from Denver to San Jose Tuesday, then needed the rest of that day to get some responses from T-Mobile and United. The airline’s switch to free Starlink connectivity will fix this problem, but we are months away from that rollout reaching a significant fraction of United’s mainline fleet.

4/17/2026: Like It or Not, Google Wants to Be Your AI Travel Buddy This Summer, PCMag

I wrote up this post off an embargoed copy of Google’s announcement that we had to correct the next day because I had missed two of the finer points of this bundle of news. In my halfhearted defense, it is more work than you might realize keeping track of Google’s ongoing efforts to infuse AI into its existing services.

4/17/2026: How NTT Research’s Upgrade 2026 Helps Silicon Valley Get Ready for The Future, Mark Vena

My industry-analyst pal had do a quick video from NTT Research’s Upgrade conference in San Jose, Calif.–with that firm covering my travel costs–about some of its initiatives.

4/18/2026: 2026 Consumer Electronics Show and Lots More!, Potomac Area Technology and Computer Society/Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Personal Computer User Group/Washington Apple Pi

Despite that title–picked by the organizers at PATACS, pronounced “Pat-Aces”–I spent more time talking about other topics. Among them: my switch from Evernote to Obsidian just in time for CES, the sad state of tech policy in Washington, and my takes on self-driving cars and what’s befallen the Washington Post. As I have in previous appearances before these folks, I showed up with a bag of trade-show swag and gave away all of it.

4/19/2026: Blue Origin Rocket Launches, Then Loses AST SpaceMobile BlueBird Satellite, PCMag

I watched the third launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket on my phone as I was walking up to the security checkpoint at Dulles early Sunday morning, started writing up what I thought was a successful launch, then learned–via painfully slow inflight WiFi–that New Glenn’s second stage had failed to deliver AST’s mobile-broadband BlueBird satellite to the intended orbit. This is a real black eye for Blue that should outweigh its achievement in reflying a New Glenn booster and then landing it on a barge in the Atlantic.

i hope the hourly "no smoking" announcement at the #lvcc stops when #defcon really starts tomorrow

For D.C.-area types of my age, the obvious advantage of the Walter E. Washington Convention Center over the old Washington Convention Center is that the facility that replaced that grim concrete hulk in 2003 isn’t a beige fortress that deadens multiple city blocks.

But in addition to greeting Mount Vernon Square with a mostly-glass facade and leaving space (not all of it filled) for retail and restaurants along 9th and 7th Streets, my city’s largest events venue has a less obvious benefit for both locals and visitors of my age: lots of nap-compatible couches by the windows upstairs.

I can’t prove that the center’s interior designers wanted to leave room for attendees to enjoy a power nap after lunch. But how else are you supposed to read a six-foot-long leather couch on a quiet passageway positioned to catch sunbeams by a window? Especially if you’re the human of a cat that would immediately curl up for a nap in a spot like that?

So as I’ve done during previous events at the convention center that weren’t mobbed by CES-level crowds (hint: none here are), I took efficient advantage of this option as I spent Monday through Wednesday covering the Satellite 2024 trade show.

It helps that a) I don’t care what it looks like when I fold up a fleece jacket to serve as a pillow and then nod off for the 5 minutes, 10 minutes tops, that usually refresh me, and b) I learned how to power nap effectively in college. Credit for that goes to the newspaper I wrote for almost all four years at Georgetown, the Georgetown Voice.

Starting my junior year, I realized that a 15- or 20-minute break between classes would allow barely enough time for perpetually sleep-deprived me to crash for a few minutes on the couch in a side room of the paper’s offices–a couch that was so disgustingly unclean that you wouldn’t want to spend more than a few minutes having any unexposed skin in contact with it.

The habit stuck even as newsroom life didn’t allow the luxury of napping on the job; instead, I’d waste more time traipsing down to the cafeteria to get a coffee that would never quite do the job. Freelance life, however, has liberated me to enjoy a postprandial snooze both at home and in event venues with the right furniture.

Because D.C.’s convention center isn’t the only one to offer this tiny luxury. The West Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center also seems to have benefited from the same thoughtful interior design–and no, I’m not proud that I’ve spent enough hours there to know this detail that well.

Updated 3/22/2024 to add the duration of my usual nap, which I realize may make some of you jealous.

https://robpegoraro.com/2024/03/21/this-could-be-the-least-appreciated-aspect-of-d-c-s-convention-center/

#conventionCenter #drowsy #GeorgetownVoice #lvcc #nap #postprandial #Satellite2024 #siesta #sleepy #snooze #WalterEWashingtonConventionCenter #WashingtonConventionCenter #yawn

@Ajediday

/9 - ' There are ALWAYS #OtherOptions available iF you can carve out other Outcome Based Experiences... So... make I.T. happen. #LatinQuotes

#Caturday is #Sunday today, officially

🎥__😼__📡🛰️📺 🏟️🏈🦶🎉

🏈🦶🏟️🎉😼. #BayArea 🦉📡🛰️📺

😼🏈🦶#SuperbOwl 🦉#LVCC 📡🛰️📺👀👀👀👀😅😬

Vegas Loop ausprobiert: Musks dümmste Idee ever?

In Las Vegas verbindet der "Loop" die Messehallen – und bald die Hotels am "Strip". Unterirdisch geht es mit Teslas durch die Röhre. Eine Testfahrt.

https://www.heise.de/meinung/Vegas-Loop-ausprobiert-Musks-duemmste-Idee-ever-7451566.html?wt_mc=sm.red.ho.mastodon.mastodon.-.-

#CES #ElonMusk #LVCC #TeslaMotors #TheBotingCompany #Tunnel #VegasLoop #autonomesFahren

Vegas Loop ausprobiert: Musks dümmste Idee ever?

In Las Vegas verbindet der "LVCC Loop" die Messehallen – und bald die Hotels am "Strip". Unterirdisch geht es mit Teslas durch die Röhre. Eine Testfahrt.

https://www.heise.de/meinung/Vegas-Loop-ausprobiert-Musks-duemmste-Idee-ever-7451566.html?wt_mc=sm.red.ho.mastodon.mastodon.-.-

#CES #ElonMusk #LVCC #TeslaMotors #TheBotingCompany #Tunnel #VegasLoop #autonomesFahren

BERLIN–I’ve been to CES 15 times and I’ve only attended IFA once, so I don’t have an enormous amount of experience with this trade show to compare it to the one that’s been welded to my calendar since 1998. But a few things jump out at me.

One is attendance. Although CES doesn’t draw as many attendees–156,153 this January, compared to 239,518 for last year’s IFA–the former convention feels more crowded. I think that’s because IFA, unlike CES, sells tickets to the public (last year, about 105,000 people) but doesn’t admit them until after two days reserved for the press and other “trade visitors.”

Another reason has to be the location. The Las Vegas Convention Center consists of three enormous halls large enough to store airplane hangars, while the Berlin Messe sprawls across 27 smaller structures. The LVCC pays for that simpler setup with perpetually gridlocked connecting passages, while this facility offers more, and more confusing, ways to get around. Some of these connections can only be described as Escher-esque.

The Berlin Messe also offers more food options with shorter lines–and beer on tap–and its bathrooms seem less disgusting than the LVCC’s.

The selection of exhibitors at IFA and CES doesn’t overlap nearly as much as I thought. While you have the same usual electronics-industry suspects–LG, Panasonic, Samsung, Sony, Toshiba but, of course, not Apple–IFA draws fewer obscure Asian manufacturers but collects far more appliance vendors.

These companies, many European-only operations that I’d never heard of until getting here, fill the lower levels of eight halls. I have never felt so inadequate about my oven, dishwasher, refrigerator, washer and dryer until now. Another, more pleasant, side effect: All of these manufacturers feel compelled to show off how well these machines work by offering snacks and beverages prepared with them, causing this part of IFA to double as a cooking show.

Far more actual news happens at CES, so that makes it more relevant overall–covering technology without going to that show borders on journalistic malpractice. (As you know, the Consumer Electronics Association pays me to blog for them, but I would have written the previous sentence anytime in the last 15 years.)

Getting to and from the show and around the city, however, is no contest: The U-Bahn shuts down the Las Vegas Monorail in every way. Berlin itself is more my kind of city, with things like walkable neighborhoods, mostly human-scale architecture and trees that can grow without constant irrigation. Yeah, Vegas has casinos–but there is one a short walk from the press center here, on the third floor of Hall 7. I think I’ll show a little more common sense than I do at most CESes and save that distraction for some other time.

(Updated 9/5 with an embedded slideshow of my Flickr set from the IFA trip, included after the jump.)

https://robpegoraro.com/2012/09/01/comparing-ifa-to-ces/

#Berlin #BerlinMesse #ces #conventions #IFA #LasVegas #LasVegasMonorail #lvcc #Nevada #tradeShows #UBahn #Vegas