I thought this was pretty much a fact? Who really thought Sony would continue CELL?

*sighs :(

I plan to keep my PS3, but, they better have a premium model PS4 that reads PS3 games.  I'd like to have a second PS3, and having it double as a PS4 would be a selling point..

I take it you thought it would continue? Sorry. :(

But considering they stopped working on it a couple years ago, sold all rights to it, and then IBM stop pursuing it as well... and Vita doesn't use any variation of it... I just figured it was common thought at this point. 

Shifting from NVidia to AMD GPU doesn't imply by any mean having to change CPU too.
The biggest hurdle in the Cell history was its initial design and development, after it, its evolution isn't very different from other CPUs, and for its PPEs it can simply adopt the evolutions of IBM POWER cores, just like MS and Ninty do for their consoles' CPUs. Being modular, if Sony sees developers came to use most of its SPEs slowly, for the next versions it can just add little more of them and more PPEs, plain and simple. But evolution of libraries and dev tools also means that now making good use of SPEs should be a lot easier than five years ago.
Adopting AMD GPUs, OTOH, makes a lot of sense, as while in the high end AMD and NVidia frequently replaceeach other at the leadership, in the mid range, normally adopted by consoles, AMD offers most often the best value.

Sucker Punch has sung nothing but praise for the processor.

Team ICO has problems but there's no real evidence to point at the Cell being one of them.

Team ICO said that actual development didnt start on TLG for awhile due to studying the complicated PS3 architect. Sucker  stated during a interview on infamous 2 that they had trouble with the PS3 architect in infamous 1 and ended up not using it efficiently which they improved in infamous 2

Is that why the PS3 wasn't backwa....oh wait.  Not to knock you down, I know they got rid of the emotion engine chip later, but one thing I respect when they did was droping the ps3 by $100, while a ps2 was $100....seems like if you wanted ps2/ps1 games you had the same option, even if you couldn't find a fat ps3.  With the PS3 not having as big of a base or software lineup as the ps2 it might actually be more reasonable to include it this time around than last, unless there is some notable damage to the price of the system.  They will probably look to sell ps3's after ps4, but not for as long as ps2 since this gen has been lasting a while.  My guess is that ps4 will have backwards compatibilty to support ongoing ps3 software releases, maybe digital discount style, but the ps3 will halt production as soon as the number plummet, 2 years after or so (it won't have the shelf life ps2 had, just long life for current owners).  PS3 software might last longer than the hardware....idk what I'm talking about, don't listen to me...where's my wife?

I heard that they would go for an IBM processor that would incorporate some Cell technology a long time ago. Anyway, speculating about things we don't know about is useless.

keep in mind, the cell is *not* the "sony-processor", it was developed by ibm and toshiba, too. so if you look at the cell at general now, it was seldom used in toshiba-tvs and currently only in 2 servers from top500. the idea of cell was new when invented, but gpus have made them almost obsolete by offering even more power and an easy-to-use programming interface.
and of course, if sony ditches cell, backwards-compatibility is also ditched.

I am glad they are ditching the cell but didn't sony buy the toshiba cell prodection plant a while back?