Why does The Times need 12 months before it introduces a metered system for charging readers for content? Or rather, why announce it so far ahead?

Speculation that an announcement was meant to be timed to the release of the Apple Tablet, rumored to be the topic of a big Cupertino “event” slated for Jan. 27, have been dismissed (often in the same venues in which it was initially raised.)

The paper may simply have had…