I feel ya, OP, and I have to say that OM and his team sure does have a defensive way of approaching the market. Much to the fact that they have a large and loyal fanbase.
From a general marketing standpoint, what they're doing is not very clever in terms of making lots of money and spreading the word, but let's just hope they eventually will release the damn thing.
After all, if I were a developer on their team, I'd be very grateful for having this large bunch of weirdos giving feedback every day, helping me make an awesome sim, but then again, atleast I would have said something if things weren't going as they should and the game development was in danger of being cancelled.