Valve is a weird company, and gamers can be weird people. DotA had a culture where doxxing icefrog is really looked down upon. Valve games tend to have these sorts of cultures and quirks.
Needless to say, valve created a relatively accessible way to play their game under development. Most companies don't do this. All Valve requested was to not publicize the game. If you are a gaming journalist, and you break this sort of online etiquette, which is very well established thing for Valve, then you get to be called out for being a dick.
> they chose not to in this instance
because as you said it is kinda silly and the game is an open secret. Doing this is not part of their culture, but the openness accessibility of their betas is.
> a popular new game by Valve is properly newsworthy to report upon
sure, verge has good traffic reasons to do this. gamers also have a reason to criticize this because they want to keep the way Valve does things. It is very unique.
> most don't realize that the and "Valve banned me" update is tongue-in-cheek and not the author being genuinely upset
What makes you say this? I think most people are just using this line to mock the author because they are angry nerds lol. Doesn't really matter what the intent of the author was.
So much of online gaming culture would be understood with just this line:
"If you don't wanna get flamed, don't break the ritual"
This article elucidates the point: https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2024/08/13/the-verge-...