“Yahoo! is a top global brand whose vision is to be the center of people’s online lives, and Carol Bartz is leading the development of Yahoo!’s approach to delivering personally relevant, meaningful Internet experiences. We welcome Carol Bartz to the 2010 CES keynote stage to talk about what’s next for Yahoo! and the industry.”

– Consumer Electronics Association president and CEO Gary Shapiro, Oct. 13, 2009

Now this is odd: Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Carol Bartz has canceled plans to deliver a keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January. This not a month after the Consumer Electronics Association boasted of her participation in a press release.

The reason for the cancellation: An alleged scheduling conflict. Said CEA spokesperson Jason Oxman: “Carol Bartz informed us late last week that her schedule has changed and she will no longer be able to deliver the speech at the 2010 International CES that Yahoo and CES had announced some weeks ago.”

It’s worth noting that prior to Oxman’s remark, which was posted to the comments of Tech Trader Daily, no official announcement of Bartz’s withdrawal was made. Indeed, the CEA press release issued yesterday announcing the addition of Qualcomm (QCOM) CEO Paul Jacobs to the CES keynote roster made no mention of Bartz at all. Moreover, her bio appears to have simply disappeared from the CES site.

As I said, odd.

Preliminary estimates suggest the show drew 110,000 attendees, down 22 percent from 141,150 in 2008.

A nasty little drop, although it doesn’t appear to have fazed the CEA, which is propping this year’s attendance figures with some over-the-top ALL CAPS hyperbole.

2009 INTERNATIONAL CES ELECTRIFIES AND ELICITS OPTIMISM FOR GLOBAL ECONOMY, reads the CEA press release in which the group makes its peace with the massive decline in attendance.

“Our board concluded that it is essential to have the right people attend CES. Board members reported getting more business done this year than at any prior show,” said CEA CEO Gary Shapiro. “One board member reported his company scheduled 450 customer meetings prior to CES and every one of those 450 meetings took place at the show. Quality trumps quantity when it comes to exhibitors and attendees conducting business at CES.”

At least in those years when attendance is down, anyway.

[Image Credit: Flickr International's CES photostream]

“Innovation is the best medicine to end economic stagnation,” Shapiro said. Well, if that’s the case, perhaps we need to up the prescription a bit. Because for 2009, the CEA is projecting a 0.6 percent drop in revenue–if all goes well. Things should be better in 2010, which, according to Shapiro, will herald a return to growth in the industry. Again, if all goes well. Says Shapiro, “Innovation is the moon that will cause the economic tide to blossom.”

Innovation is the moon that will cause the economic tide to blossom.

And rising on that economic tide, a million little remote-control boats, each with a little corporate logo and a diminutive CEO. And all of them, to a one, sailing forth into a new dawn of profitability. A profitability brought forth by growing unit sales, which are the sun, its every ray a glorious new revenue stream refracted in the glistening waves.

Our industry is the one that this going to get the economy through this recession.

– Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association

The International Consumer Electronics Show will kick off next week shrouded in a nimbus of recessionary gloom. Show attendance is expected to be down eight percent this year, according to Gary Shapiro, CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association, who expects 130,000 attendees to flood the convention–11,000 fewer than last year. The show floor itself will be slightly diminished as well. CES exhibitor booths required 1.8 million square feet in 2008. In 2009, they’ll take up 1.7 million, presumably thanks to the absence of Seagate (STX), Logitech (LOGI), Cisco (CSCO), Philips (PHG), Yahoo (YHOO) and Sanyo–all of which have abandoned plans to exhibit on the show floor. That said, the overall number of exhibitors will remain the same as last year, at about 2,700.

So the show will be a bit smaller and a bit less clamorous than in years past. Likely a bit more sober as well, given this rough retail year. Quite a change from the extravagance of years past, but not without a certain upside. “This is the bleakest CES in 30 years going in,” said Envisioneering Group analyst Richard Doherty. “[Some exhibitors] will be spending more of their time off the show floor. We may now be able to get between the Venetian and the convention in less than an hour.”