I did not attend Ziff Davis' inaugural Business4Site trade show in Los Angeles this week, but I did have several people attending who emailed reports back to the east coast. Ziff promised a new kind of show that would captivate the Enterprise IT audience. About 40 companies were on the floor, but to paraphrase Gertrude Stein (and Cringley) "there was no them there."

Ziff, according to attendees, apparently was giving away seminar passes and those few that did pay were obviously angry that free passes were being offered to attempt to gain attendance. Reports also indicate that the keynotes were sparsely attended and that keynote speakers were irked by the empty seats.

The Business4Site experience was somewhat similar to Jupitermedia's rough experience with cdXpo last November in Las Vegas. At the conclusion of that show I suggested that there was no need for an Enterprise IT show in Las Vegas --- now I can add Los Angeles to the list. And more recently I suggested that Gartner's Itxpo now fills the void of the "needed" Enterprise IT trade show. Gartner garners all the key exhibitors and gets high quality attendance. I am not sure why Ziff Davis thought they could pull this off with a team of hired execs who were short on creativity or market savvy.

As stated, Gartner is the winner in the category of Enterprise IT trade shows. Jupitermedia failed, CEBIT failed, Comdex is practically dead and now Ziff Davis has failed. Hail to the victor, Hail to Gartner!