It may because of the personality, the great writing, or insightful features, but there are a handful of reason to visit a particular site or read a specific gaming magazine. A reason that is not an option, not really at least, is a source’s ability to find and deliver a great story before all others. This can be said for most technologically driven media—but even more so for gaming—there should be more investigative journalism.
When readers look at multiple news feeds, they will find that most of them are very similar in content. Most sources will deliver the same news in different fashions. It often depends on the reader’s taste of writing or layout, which source he chooses to follow. For example perhaps he finds it more interesting when a site offers humor along with the news, or maybe some opinions.
The diversity in news is so lacking, because the public relations(PR) of publishers decide what makes the news and what does not. Only a few drops that leak through their hand. PR will often embargo upcoming games. An embargo, in this context, is when the news outlet receives a date and time that they may reveal the information they have. If these embargoes are not met, as punishment, the news outlet may miss out on the next announcement. So on a certain date and time, all sites publish their stories, and often, all with the same information. These sites are being used for their traffic, to promote the publisher’s next game.
From a readers point of view, if the only thing these sites offer in difference is a joke or two, then shouldn’t they be considered another form of entertainment? Can they even call themselves journalist? The “journalist” have the information; why aren’t they reporting it? This may seem like an attack on them. It’s not. It is an attack against the people in charge of marketing at the publishing companies. They want the front-page news coverages on their own terms. If a source does not follow that law; then they receive no story, which minimizes traffic, which minimizes income.
The only outlet that seems to follow their own route, are the bloggers. Bloggers don’t often go to these big press events. They get a tip, or maybe just a gut feeling, and report on it. But what happens when a blog becomes popular? The PR find them as a valuable outlet to feed information through, which brings us back to the problem of embargoes. The blog is faced with a tough decisions: do they stay true to their site and continue to leak everything out, or do they “sellout” and hold on to that knowledge? Leaking the intel can result in a loss of contact with publishers, and withholding it concludes with a loss of creditability. Only the publishers win.
Gizmodo, a gadget blog, went through some sketchy means to get their hands out on the iPhone 4 before it was revealed. This was found by may to be in poor taste. Why? They knew this was information their readers wanted and no one else had. They were doing the readers a favor, and Gizmodo was rewarded with millions of hits and recognition.
Perhaps one will wonder what a reader gain besides just getting information sooner. With multiple outlets competing to find a story, more information will be found. Consumers will have a better idea on what to spend their hard earned cash on. People like to know things. It even worse when outlets tell us they have awesome knowledge, but cannot enlighten us on said information until X day at X time.
Publisher will argue that it is for the good of the product that only some information is revealed. Message to the publishers: Listen if you want your information to be a secret, keep it just that, a secret. Do not impose rules on the sites and magazines that are giving you all of the promotion. Do not tell me it’s part of a marketing plan, because the last thing I want is that superficial bullshit you call hype. Publishers release one out-of-context screenshot a week as an attempt to build hype. They know that if they release too much information and buyers see something they don’t like they will pass on the product.
What news outlets should do is turn the table. Publishers should allow the sites and magazines to release the information received at any time. If the publisher would like some discretion, make it an exclusive with a specific outlet. If these rules are not met then the site or magazine will no longer write about there product; which reducing promotion; which reduces income.
