I’m just back from 3GSM after a hectic round of meetings, networking, exhibition hall trudging and a soupcon of partying. For those of you who didn’t make it, here’s a quick snapshots and for those of you that did - why didn’t you come and say hello?

Carlo’s been doing a great job of keeping us all up to date with all the significant news from the event, along with some fine analysis, so I won’t repeat that. But as a general impression, the event was characterised for me by a real lack of big announcements. This was typified by Motorola’s “Did you know we have a groovy phone called the RAZR?” that Carlo wrote about. Motorola also seemed to have bought out every advertising poster site in Barcelona and flown in CEO, Ed Zander, so perhaps they wanted to announce something, but weren’t quite ready.

I think the lack of big news though, is perhaps symptomatic of today’s business style. In former times, companies held back their important news for these huge industry gatherings. Now they just announce stuff when they’re ready to go to market, with the focus of these events changing much more to networking.

It’s also true that if you do have an announcement, you’re more likely to get coverage in the week after an event like 3GSM, when everyone else has shot their bolts. Ironic, really.