Suddenly, Tablet form factors are hot?or are they?

WinInfo | at | by Mike

Thanks to the never-ending build-up to Apple's inevitable tablet computer, tablets are suddenly hot, and we all have to pretend that the past eight years never happened. That's because we've had true Tablet PCs since 2002 and--let's be honest--they've never been particularly compelling to any mass audience. But it's a testament to Apple's popularity with the tech press that suddenly everyone has a tablet to sell. Some are lame retreads of what came before--the HP tablet we saw in Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's CES keynote address--and some are actually quite innovative (Lenovo) and clearly pre-date any Apple silliness. And in case you're wondering why the lame tablet made an appearance in a Microsoft keynote while the cool one didn't, remember that the Lenovo device includes a Linux-based component. It wouldn't do to have Microsoft promote that, now would it?