Back in the age of gaming magazines, getting an exclusive was really a privilege, as the other newspapers would have to wait until the next month’s (gaming magazines primarily printing monthly) print in order to keep up. In the age of the internet, however, exclusives simply mean an hour or two ahead of the competition. Developers have always had a pretty tight system of rules for offering information, and that system has (for the most part) been fair. Don’t unfairly trash the game, give ample screen time, and that is about it.
Operating a fan site (a decent fan site) is expensive work. Between managing databases and active users, the costs of bandwidth and storage space can get pretty high, and virtually any fan site not backed by some conglomerate (and many that are) offer some form of advertising to help pay down costs.
With regards to the upcoming The Old Republic, Bioware is having none of that. If you run a fan site and want any hope of Bioware talking to you, or promoting you through Twitter/Facebook, you may not accept any income whatsoever, either from advertising or from donations. None, nada, zilch. If your fan site pays its writers, you’re going to have to foot that bill yourself. If your fan site operates off of revenue from Google Ads or some other advertising, guess you’re not getting that promo or exclusive information.
Websites, especially the popular ones (which I would know nothing about), can reach bandwidth costs into the hundreds of dollars per month, and many go even higher. To demand that your fans not supplement their websites with some form of payment means that only a select few, those operated by wealthy groups of players, will have any hope at getting that sweet sweet Bioware nectar.
Of course, you could always list yourself as press and bypass that restriction. According to the website that broke the story, Toroz, Bioware is looking into the situation, and this policy may see some alterations in the coming months. That being said, when you’re about to launch your first MMO, you can’t do much worse than giving your potential customer base (given many of your fan sites wouldn’t have the funds to stay afloat without advertising revenue and donations) the middle finger and chastising them for being poor.
I’ll be following this story in case Bioware comments, and given MMO Fallout doesn’t offer advertising, perhaps I’ll have better odds at getting a statement.
MMO Fallout 