You can tell we are getting close because there seems to be an opening of information about 9.2 publicly. David Maguire lists what he views as the most significant features of the new release:
ArcGIS 9.2 has been released to manufacturing and will ship to all customers worldwide by the end of November. This project has been over 18 months in the making and represents a very significant milestone in the evolution of ArcGIS.
I think the big hits with this release will be; quality, ArcGIS On-line and standards and interoperability. We’ll see how server is received by the public when we get pricing and some demonstrations of the capabilities and how ArcGIS Explorer stacks up against Google Earth, Microsoft Virtual Earth 3D and NASA World Wind with its ArcGIS Server wild card.