Here's the rub: gaming sites have a huge financial incentive to get exclusive news and break the embargo. But if gaming sites have any of their own break the embargo, then the publisher or developer will blacklist them. So what's an enterprising gaming site to do? Hire someone to fall on their sword, a kamikaze blogger. The kamikaze blogger gets the scoop, leaks it to the site, and then takes the blacklisting.

Essentially, this agent of theirs doesn't even have to be a journalist-it can be a friend or a roommate. They just can't be officially traced back to the gaming site. The site can claim that an anonymous source gave it to them (and as it's their job to report the rumor) and subsequently gets to benefit from the exclusive leak. Other sites will clamor to report the rumor, but the way search engine optimization is set up, being first to cover a story is essential.

If you're the little guy, you need to either play nice or make sure that any leak isn't traced back to you. Increasingly, though, it's far more important to get the first story than it is to even risk being blacklisted. And this creates some really obvious problems for the industry.

The sites that abide by the embargo are punished because they lose out on the traffic. There is very little downside to the site, other than the possibility of getting blacklisted. But certain sites don't operate on relationships with developers or publishers, meaning the necessity to maintain these relationships are a moot point.

And some of the bigger sites have so many writers that virtually anyone is expendable. If you're one of the hundreds on a staff from the top five gaming sites, you getting blacklisted by Ubisoft or Activision isn't a big deal-they'll put you on another beat next time and the site won't be the worse for it (mainly because some of the top sites can never be truly punished-- the developers need them more than the other way around). Big time editors can also break the embargo, but again, this is in large part due to the juggernaut status of the publication they write for.