Apparently, if you know the right people in the right locales you can find somebody who will be willing to sell you a copy of No Man’s Sky before next week’s actual release date. And then, if you’re Polygon and/or Kotaku, you can then get that raw gameplay footage up and then ride the hitcount until Sony threatens to call down a DMCA on your position. I haven’t decided how I feel about any of that, by the way.
No, really. It’s kind of a weird situation. Not really pirating – the software company gets paid – but I can see how the practice is at least a little hinky.