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GeekWire’s Taylor Soper at CES with the Lumia 2520

LAS VEGAS — Team GeekWire has arrived at the 2014 International CES, which gets rolling today with preliminary press briefings followed by the traditional CES Unveiled event at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center. After some mixed results at the sports book over the past day (seriously, Cincinnati?) we’re ready to get to work.

Our goal during the next few days will be to provide a sense for the technologies most likely to make an impact on our lives and businesses over the next year and beyond. Wearables, new automotive technologies, sensors and cloud computing will be front and center this year, but we’ll also be on the lookout for new PCs, tablets and smartphones, with some surprises along the way.

Keynote addresses will be delivered this week by execs including Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, Sony CEO Kaz Hirai, and Intel CEO Brian Krzanich. AT&T is also having a big developer summit in conjunction with CES again this year, and we’ll be there, as well.

In addition, we’ll be checking in with several Seattle-area companies expected to make news here, including Valve, T-Mobile, Innovega, INRIX and at least one startup that you’ve never heard about before, making its public debut here.

If you’ve been to CES before, you know it’s a zoo. My colleague Taylor Soper is here for the first time. I’m back after a hiatus, and looking forward to jumping back into the chaos. No, Apple and Amazon are not here officially, and Microsoft doesn’t have the big public presence here that it once did, but it’s still arguably the best place to get a sense for the future of technology, all in one place over the course of a few days.

“You’ll see technologies that are technology feasible, and you’ll see technologies that are commercially viable,” said Shawn DuBravac, chief economist at the Consumer Electronics Association, in the pre-show press briefing on key trends to watch at the show. “It’s important to distinguish between the two.”

He cited flexible displays as an example of technologies at this year’s show that are technically possible but not yet ready for broad commercial availability.

This week I’m taking the opportunity to test the Nokia Lumia 2520 tablet and its LTE connectivity. (If you’re reading this post, it’s working so far.) If only I had been able to get my hands on the elusive Nokia Power Keyboard, it would be the ultimate CES coverage machine. As it is, I’m typing this out with the on-screen keyboard, which is proving less than optimal. I’ll post a full write-up based on my experience with the device after the show.

Thanks for tuning in, let us know what you’re most interested in hearing about, and stay tuned for much more in the days ahead.

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