00063: The timing of this makes no sense, with Skyblivion almost out.
Unless Bethesda is worried that Skyblivion will steal some of the market share that Oblivion Remastered would otherwise gobble up. It wouldn't surprise me if the thinking is to beat Skyblivion to release in order to get as many sales as possible from people who otherwise might download Skyblivion if it were released first.
Now personally, I don't think there would really be that much overlap between players who will buy the Remaster and players who would rather have Skyblivion, but I'm also not a corporate stooge who panics at the thought of possibly losing a few sales because of a fan-built project. :)