Hi folks.
Wow, my own little manual thread. I feel so honored.
Anyway, regarding the OP's question, the manual will not be released early, sadly. OOTP 10's manual is also online, very similar to last year's. (Hey, with that monster, there's no way I'm taking on a full rewrite unless I HAVE to.

)
Andreas will likely create some way of getting the entire manual into PDF format for those who wish to download. However, I want to stress that it will NOT be a "formatted for print" manual. It's more likely to be "every single HTML file converted into PDF," if that makes any sense.
By the way, I totally agree with what everyone has to say about the lack of communication this year.

We certainly need to do better next year.
Ciao!
Steve