Welcome to the New MacWorld

Who needs Apple? Actually, the exhibitors at this week's MacWorld-iWorld Expo do, even if the profit-gobbling mothership hasn't deigned to show up for several years.

These days more than ever, Apple is all about Apple. The company still plays nice with its app developers, by and large, but scarcely acknowledges the vibrant ecosystem of case designers, keyboard dock makers, external storage drive suppliers, and all the other firms that thrive in the churn of the consumer electronics giant's colossal wake.

And so it is that MacWorld isn't quite the spectacle it was when Apple was using it as a platform to launch products like the first iPhone and the ground-breaking MacBook Air. Attendance is about half of what it was in those salad days and the show has struggled to find a unifying theme absent Apple's keynotes and product unveilings.

But not for want of trying. IDG, which puts on MacWorld, has added "iWorld" to the end of the show's name to reflect "the essence of what a mobile lifestyle is," event general manager Paul Kent told USA Today recently.

Out on the exhibition floor at Moscone West, that shift is apparent. A vanishingly small amount of the apps, gear, and accessories on offer have anything to do with Mac computers, but accoutrement related to the iPhone and iPad is everywhere.

In the end, maybe it's a good thing that Apple finally pulled out of this show and allowed the current vendors to exhibit their wares out from under its massive shadow. The makers of products like iBallz and Snaptotes may be the red-headed stepchildren of the Apple empire, but they're offering us something the Cupertino control freaks may someday come to value again – different and lively ways to incorporate Apple technology into our lives that don't completely lock us into a single company's monolithic vision.

With that in mind, check out the slideshow above for some of our favorite MacWorld-iWorld presenters Apple hasn't quite managed to sweep under the rug.