Good news, folks: today was the first day of the actual "Expo" side of Macworld Conference & Expo, and despite widespread fears of a seriously dead show, Think Secret reports that the show floor was "crowded, vibrant, and packed with attendees"! Indeed, they've got photographic evidence that there were actual people there, bustling about in largely the same way as we remember attendees doing at the New York shows of summers past, so even with Apple's absence and the echoing void where a Stevenote might have gone, it seems that moving the Expo back to Boston didn't completely crater the event after all.

Of course, then there's the bad news: the Cult of Mac has a snapshot of "the entire Macworld exhibit floor" from Monday before the show opened, and it seems our earlier suggestion that we hold pick-up games of ATV floor hockey in the unused floor space weren't entirely off the mark. The term "yawning chasm" comes to mind. Think Secret has a similar photo taken after the show floor opened, and if anything, it's even more depressing when you see the attendees crammed in way at the back, there. It's obviously a lot easier to make a show look "crowded, vibrant, and packed" when you constrain traffic to "about half the floor space of the smallest" of the convention center's "three giant show floors."

It's too early for attendance numbers (even assuming that IDG World Expo doesn't suppress the bejeezus out of them), but no one expected a high turnout with Apple refusing to come and most vendors then following suit. Indeed, most people would get the impression that IDG only refused to cancel the show (or move it back to New York) out of sheer stubbornness, which is exactly the sort of behavior we might have expected back when Charlie "You Want a Piece of Me?" Greco was running things and threatening to ban Apple from the San Francisco show if it didn't drag its snooty hinder here to Boston. But Greco "left" IDG ages ago, and we were as surprised as anybody when his successor 1) decided to keep the show in Boston as promised, and 2) refused to cancel it even in the face of overwhelming public indifference.

Well, believe it or not, the stubbornness doesn't stop there. Think Secret reports that IDG is "already advertising the dates for next year's Macworld Expo in Boston," and has the photo to prove it. Now, okay, the banner just says "See You Next Year," which could well mean "See You Next Year Back in New York Because Boy Are We Ever Sorry We Dug Our Heels in on This Whole Boston Thing"-- except that an IDG rep told internetnews.com that "the company is already booking the new waterfront Boston Convention & Exhibition Center for Macworld in 2005." So yes, as of now, at least, the show is staying in Boston next year-- and once again, Apple says that it won't be coming. IDG bigwig Warwick Davies's response? He never invited them anyway. Seriously, how can you not love this stuff?

In any case, we're hoping to hit the show floor ourselves tomorrow, so we'll finally get to see what an Appleless Macworld Expo looks like firsthand. If anyone's up for floor hockey, we figure it won't be too hard to find us.