Are Apps as relevant to tablets?

I'm hoping that the birthday fairy is going to be kind to me next month and bring me my first tablet. I'm very excited at the prospect but it's got me thinking about the role that apps have to play on such devices. (and as I come to write now I don't know whether apps should be capitalised, put in inverted commas or what. I'll stick with lowercase I think).

Anyway, there are obviously stock apps without which the device would be useless. A web browser, a media player and a camera spring immediately to mind. Then there are places where a specifically designed app will probably prove useful. Games are an obvious one. Also any app which leverages specific elements of the hardware such as GPS tracking.

But beyond that, I wonder whether I'll use apps over the browser? Looking at my smartphone the likes of Facebook, IMDB, Train Times, GMail, Twitter, eBay, Amazon etc etc etc all have perfectly functional websites which are often far better than their apps - I tend to think that the apps just exist because a screen size of 4 inches isn't conducive to using most websites. But when you get that up to the 7" or more mark with a minimum resolution of 1024 x 600, I think a lot of websites will become useable.

I suppose I'll just have to wait, see and report back. And if I don't get a tablet, I'll fit a magnifying glass to my phone and pretend.