For a few hours yesterday, a breathless rumor floated up about HP and Microsoft unveiling a tablet mobile device that could steal Apple’s thunder about its upcoming iSlate. The interesting part of the rumor was that it emerged in The New York Times.

The Grey Lady used to be more cautious about its speculations, but the staff flowing in from online jobs have stretched the rumor envelope. The tiny article in the Times‘ Bits blog was written by Ashlee Vance, new to the newspaper’s staff after a long and flashy run at the Web site The Register.

The Microsoft “slate computer” was supposed to be part of MS VP Steve Ballmer’s keynote speech last night. Alas, what some around HP are calling The Courier didn’t debut. Vance wrote great articles for The Register, but the standards for rumors are limbo-low over there.

Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, will unveil a novel take on a slate-type computer during his evening keynote.

The Times only posted the initial rumor article on the Bits blog, not in a printed edition, so the editors only figured they had to post a generic follow-up today on the non-story. The rumor report shows how little can be counted upon for innovation from Microsoft. HP has had its hands on touchscreen technology since 1984, but the last two years it has had serious touch products released. Last night’s cobble was not one of them.

One of the best summaries of What Just Didn’t Happen came in the comments to the Vance article. One reader quoted the line from the article, “So the last thing Mr. Ballmer wants to hold up is a me-too device,” then added

The good news for MS: That didn’t happen.
The bad news for MS: Nothing else happened, either.The Microsoft blasts are just a click away in this story:

Just another full-blown Ballmer clownboy fiasco. Courier was vaporware. MS went out of their way to throw their cards down on the table and show that they’ve got NOTHING, and plenty of it. If Jobs shows up to demo a yo-yo, he beats Ballmer now.

Journalists still want to write stories that kill off or condemn with faint praise the interesting mobile device coming from Apple. Predictions are a loser’s bet, but we all want to deliver them.

Far better advance reports on the iSlate are coming from Jon Gruber at his daringfireball.net site. I’ll just echo what he’s forecast — an impressive range of content, sculpted for the Apple device, will be part of the vendor’s rollout solution. You want to read a Conde Nast publication online? Some say those pubs will be ready on Day One of the iSlate rollout.

Gruber is also dead-on about an App Store or iTunes experience for the iSlate. Apple takes 30 cents of every dollar for apps and music. This new mobile tool will be a revenue generator for Apple, and not just from the sales of the hardware.