Fox News Reviewer immediately fired for early review

[DKII]

"By comparison, the first time a well known, 10 year veteran film reviewer posts an early review, he is fired immediately."

You're trying to use this example to prove your point, when it simply isn't true. He was fired for conducting illegal activity on the job, it had nothing to do with the review being early. If someone at IGN pirated a copy of the game a week early and reviewed it as an early exclusive, he'd be fired too. As would someone here, for that matter.

I get that you're arguing about the gaming industry focusing on early news and exclusives, but your supporting evidence doesn't say what you think it says.

The reason for the focus in gaming on early/exclusive news is probably simply that the gaming media is younger and thus more competitive. The movie industry has the big boys already established and fat and happy so there's no need to bring in extra traffic with early/exclusive news. It's also just a bigger industry to I'm sure harder to negotiate for extra perks like that.

You're speaking of journalistic ethics, not ethics in general. Journalistic ethics only apply to journalists. And frankly I think if the publishers are giving out free games they can attach whatever conditions they like to them, and if the journalists protest enough then the publishers who aren't jerks will get more coverage and attention and win out. Likewise the unethical journalists will eventually lose their credibility and their audience. It's a self-reinforcing system.

Media in other fields (sports, entertainment, politics) negotiate for exclusive interviews and try to get exclusive scoops all the time, and no doubt an exclusive interview results in more softball questions and exclusive access to some person or area results in more favorable coverage. I'm not sure why you think that's limited to the gaming media.