[By Nic Lindh on Tuesday, 12 June 2007]
Or, the morally instructive tale of one man’s first and last Stevenote.
The day started at 5:50 a.m., when it was time to rise and shine in order to go revel in the Reality Distortion Field.
But first the most important meal of the day. Ingested some continental breakfast at the hotel and was flabbergasted to find that no, it was not complimentary, but instead cost $16. Seriously, $16 for coffee and a bagel? Do they ship it over the bay on Larry Ellison’s yacht?
Made it to the Moscone a little before 7 o’clock and was gobsmacked to see the line stretch literally halfway around the block. It was complete with panhandlers and That Nerd with the piercing voice who could not be made to shut up and who kept pestering everybody around him with his misunderstood greatness and the underestimated technological wonders he had brought an uncaring world.
The doors opened and we shuffled into Moscone, a sad parade of excited nerds. And then the line stopped. And then the line started. And stopped. Etc. There were way too many nerds in too little space. Sticky sweatiness.
<a href=’/images/0611070831a.jpg’ rel=“shadowbox” title=’Zombies or nerds? You be the judge’><img src=’/images/0611070831a.thumbnail.jpg’ alt=’Zombies or nerds? You be the judge’ rel=’lightbox’ />
Then the keynote. It was great to see it live in the flesh, although it was obviously not one of Steve’s greatest showings.
I’m not going to talk too much about the contents of the keynote, since the whole Internet is already aflutter with reading the entrails and consumed with holy anger about the lack of an iPhone SDK.
Apart from the content of this particular keynote itself, the star of the show was of course the keynote itself and the presence of the Holy Steve. Ah, the basking.
Yes, the basking. Get up early, stand in line for three hours in claustrophobic corridors with a bunch of people who need remedial lessons in personal hygiene, and all to behold something that is being live-blogged on the Internet and then streamed for anybody to see in the comfort of their favorite chairs later in the day.
I’m not saying it wasn’t cool; I’m just saying the next time I voluntarily stand in line for three hours, there had better be the best food or the best sex of my entire existence at the end of that line. Or both.