The more I read about the likely hood of an AppleTV 3 the more likely I think there will be no actual TV.
Although Jobs is dead I can picture him saying "Everybody wants a Smart TV. Now everybody can have one...."
Apple can, if they get it right, give everyone a smart TV. No need to pay over the odds when they can do it for $99 or what ever the price may be.
Sign into the ATV with your iCloud account and you will have your mail, photo's and of course your iTunes match music synced with your Mac, iPhone, iPad.
I've never seen the logic in building a whole television, mainly because it would be the ONE Apple product that would have to win it's buyers on hardware alone (assuming there's a set-top box called

TV3 containing the same- or most of the same- software functionality).
What makes iPhones, iPads, Macs, etc price justifiable is the software experience. The hardware alone can't overly compete head-to-head. Imagine if we could get iOS or OS-X by itself and install them on ANYONES hardware in an Apple-endorsed way. Do we still want to buy only Apple's hardware in that scenario?
A whole television with an

TV built in vs. and

TV hooked to ANY television is asking consumers to pay the Apple premium for the hardware alone- the case, the Apple logo on the front, the esthetics of no separate box or a cable from a separate

TV to the TV. The screen will be made by someone else- probably LG, Sharp, Sony or Samsung. Apple can't possibly pick the right screen size for the masses as only pockets of the masses can be happy with a single size. Plasma vs. LCD vs. LED vs. OLED? Ports or no ports? Apple would be making all those decisions.
Then, whoever Apple paid to build the hardware for them would probably roll out the exact same screen with lots of ports under their own brand for 25%-40% less than Apple's price. Buy that one and get the exact same screen. Add an

TV and get the exact same software. Save hundreds of dollars and get the exact same experience. Unless I'm missing something, maybe one could pry off the Samsung/Sony/LG/etc. logo and put one of those Apple stickers in it's place?
For these reasons and others, I just don't see the whole television rumor actually flying. If it does, I think they have to kill the

TV to reunify hardware & exclusive software to justify the price they'll want. It seems much more sensible to put the experience in the little box and attach that to the HDTVs we already own.