The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is one of the biggest trade shows out there, acting as a central point for the growing global consumer electronics industry. Here, firms come to show off their new products and latest innovations.

As schools worldwide seek to deal with an invasion of tablet PCs in the classroom, a Thailand government program has apparently decided that “if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em”: A pilot program distributed some 500 free tablet PCs to first- and fourth-graders in five urban schools in the country, and plans are afoot to supply 470,000 first-graders with the devices this year.

With more and more tablets entering the already crowded market place, tech giants are reducing prices in order to draw attention to their products.

Consultancy/market research firm NPD DisplaySearch has released its Quarterly Mobile PC Shipment and Forecast Report, with all numbers and trending indicating the massive wave of popularity the devices are enjoying worldwide.

From live interviews on the street, editing in the newsroom and sharing pieces, tablets have entered the journalism in sometimes predictable and other times unforeseeable ways. But are they really revolutionary? This week’s column takes a peek into how tablets are making a name for themselves in the industry built on paperboys.

For tablet PCs, the previous year was marked by one of unparalleled success unseen by an electronic device since perhaps the introduction of the CD player. But has the popularity of tablets essentially made the laptop PC a dinosaur altogether?

Market intelligence analysts IDC have released a report showing how tablet sales are panning out for different companies as we near the end of 2011. The report showed that Apple actually lost about 2% of the worldwide market share from second to third quarter, going from a whopping 63.3% to a still whopping 61.5%.

The folks over at Netbooklive have put out a very useful article talking up the differences between ultrabooks (very slim & lightweight laptops, SSD inside) and tablets. Here’s a summary of how the two compare:

Equation research has conducted a study of 1500 online shoppers showing that the average holiday shop is upwards to $325. 238 of the respondents were tablet users, who cited convenience as the top reason for shopping online.

Market research analysts eMarketer have released survey results forecasting that 35% of Internet users in America will use a tablet at least once per month. By focusing on device sharing rather than total amount of units sold,this survey sheds light on tablet use rather than just consumption. Along with user data, the survey also shows that gaps in use between gender as well as between age groups are likely to even out.