Any day now.

That P. T. Barnum of the digital age, Steve Jobs, knows how to milk free publicity. Before being fired from Apple in May, 1985, he joked that Apple was a ship that leaked from the top. He had not yet learned the power of silence.

Then, upon rejoining Apple just over ten years later, he knew better. The less you said the more they wrote and speculated about the next Great Thing, and while I have no idea how much this strategy garnered in free publicity for the iPhone, you can bet the amount was huge. I doubt there was a more anticipated introduction of a consumer gadget in the history of consumer gadgets.

The next Great Thing, the touchscreen iTablet, will likely be introduced on January 27, 2010 and there are so many indicia of the device’s imminent arrival that it’s hardly a long shot prediction.

iSlate/iTablet – artist’s rendering.

Books, magazines and newspapers getting readied, games being redesigned for larger screen resolution, components procured, a meeting hall booked for a January Apple special, leaks from parts suppliers in Taiwan and China and, most recently, disclosure that the iSlate.com domain has been registered in Apple’s name for a couple of years. iSlate sounds pretty neat to me. A nice throwback to the days of Moses delivering the Ten Commandments.

This device is unlikely to be as earth shattering as the iPhone because it will be perceived as costlier, for one. Consumers still naively believe that the iPhone costs $100-$200 when the all in 2 year contract cost is closer to $2,000. But it’s tempting to speculate what the iSlate will cost. My guess is that the $599 number bruited about is unrealistic. The iPhone, with its miniscule screen, would cost that at retail absent the telco’s subsidy.

If the iSlate really is to have a 7-10″ touchscreen in glorious color, 3G, wifi and a long life battery, $1300 is more like it, and that would dictate lower margins than Apple’s existing MacBook Pro. Still, Apple did mention at their last earnings call that they anticipate falling gross margins going forward and it’s unclear whether this reflects an attempt at increased market share (not consonant with their traditional thinking) or, maybe, a lower than usual margin on the iSlate. So I’m guessing $999. That will make it less than the blockbuster expected, the economies of the west still being in recovery from a brush with death, and the effect on the stock will not be a happy one.

This will, I believe, be a “buy the rumor, sell the news” type of investment opportunity.

But I think the device’s relevance to educated consumers (who constitute a small minority of cell phone users, let’s face it) will be great. It will become the news delivery tool of choice for those who prefer not to waste their time on the pap passing for news on the networks or on cable – I’m reminded of the old saying that the front page of any major newspaper has more news than a 30 minute network news broadcast. It will become a powerful marketing tool for those seeking to display pictures, models, sketches, ideas on the fly. Engineers, design professionals, doctors and investment gurus will love it. You will watch movies and play games on it. And it will be a wonderful tool for the display of photographs, maybe with limited processing tools included. Imagine using such a tool in the studio as a preview device connected to your DSLR in live view mode with an art director peering at the screen over your shoulder.

And for a company which never lets form take a back seat to function, you can bet that the iSlate/iTablet/iWhatever will look absolutely fabulous. I can’t wait to see what it’s all about. The introduction date is January 27, 2010.

Disclosure: I am long AAPL call options. If you think this blog is a source of investment advice, I can get you a deal on a bridge in Brooklyn.