According to Destructoid.com, today during Activision Blizzard's earning call, it was announced that there would be a public beta of the highly anticipated Diablo III set to be released some time in Q3 of this year.
With this news out, based on what was seen with Starcraft II, there is a chance that Diablo III may see the light of day sometime before 2012!
Alternatively if the game is somehow pushed back until 2012 Blizzard has stated that there would then be at least two titles from the company coming out in that calendar year.