Self Service Expo 2007 opens

NEW YORK — KioskCom's Self Service Expo opened today at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in New York City. More than 90 exhibitors were on hand, running the gamut from self-checkout units to burn-on-demand kiosks to interactive digital signage.

Joel Davis, president of organizer JD Events, said a heavy emphasis was placed on attendee quality over quantity.

"We made significant efforts to make sure each attendee is a legitimate merchant deployer," he said. "I wanted a pure, qualified audience — no soliciting on site. Each application was reviewed by a human."

Davis said about 1,000 attendees were registered for the expo, with another 250 registered for the educational sessions. Those sessions included a keynote presentation on strategic approaches to self-service.

Elsewhere in the classrooms, Peter Kaszycki of Vertical Alliance and Ronald Bowers of Frank Mayer & Associates gave an introduction to self-service and digital signage; Tom Hammond of Clear Channel partnered with Alex Richardson of Selling Machine Partners for a look at the "A-Z's of Interactive Digital Signage"; Sumit Oberai of Indigo Music & Books talked about defining success criteria for self-service; and Debra Chin of the United States Postal Service dissected the best practices of user interface design.

Heavily trafficked areas of the show floor on day one included the GestureTek booth, where the company's immersive and touch-free technology stopped virtually all passersby; meanwhile, at the Apollo Display Technologies booth, crowds queued to see transflexive displays, which capture ambient light and use it to make the display brighter (i.e. the more sunlight shines on a display, the brighter the display gets).

Watch this site in the coming days for full, in-depth coverage of the Self-Service Expo exhibitors and their technologies.