Microsoft will attend the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2010, but will its mega-booth face off against an Apple exhibition?

When asked if Apple will attend CES, a spokesperson with the Consumer Electronics Association, which hosts the high-profile event, told eWEEK, "They are not currently exhibiting."

For a while, though, the answer to that question seemed to depend on whom you asked.

As reported by The Wall Street Journal's Ben Charny on July 29, Apple indeed planned on being present at CES in 2010. However, despite being asked to keynote, Apple CEO Steve Jobs had apparently not returned any calls left for him by Gary Shapiro, chief executive of the Consumer Electronics Association.

Charny suggested that he had learned of Apple's plans at a dinner for journalists in San Francisco, which Shapiro attended. Within hours of his posting about it, though, Ryan Block at Engadget wrote his own post calling the information "specious and flatly wrong."

"I was seated directly across from Gary, and present for the entire conversation," Block wrote. "Shapiro [mentioned] that Apple was a great and long-standing supporter of the efforts of the CEA, but that their only direct involvement was sending a check each year to pay their membership dues."

Apple has largely withdrawn from the conference scene, having announced in December 2008 that it would no longer attend Macworld Expo. Within that context, its presence at CES would be something of a surprise, although the spokesperson's statement technically leaves the door open to a possible appearance. But CES will still feature some 25,000 square feet of space for the iLounge, an area devoted to iPhone and iPod gear.

Two other high-profile CEOs, Microsoft's Steve Ballmer and Intel's Paul Otellini, will attend the event. Microsoft has traditionally used CES as a platform to show off a number of its more, well, consumer-oriented products, such as the Xbox 360.

Ballmer gave the CES pre-show keynote in 2009, and will do so again on Jan. 6 next year. In the past, Bill Gates was the one to give the speech, until he retired to save the world. Paul Otellini will give his own keynote on Jan. 7.

Should Apple beat the odds and actually decide to attend CES, they could consider setting up their booth next to Microsoft's. After all, Microsoft plans on opening a handful of its upcoming retail stores in close proximity to Apple's retail outlets, in an attempt to both steal market share and aggravate Jobs, who's probably being told to stay away from stress after the installation of his new iLiver.