Breakfast Topic: And the slow news week is going to be over...

This has been a slow and very quiet week in the World of Warcraft. It almost seems like the calm before the storm that a whole bunch of warlords on Draenor are going to bring to Azeroth. Many in the community are eagerly anticipating the beta test of the next expansion, yet it seems to be forever in the future.

I've been vocal enough on the issue -- my feeling is that the longer Blizzard waits to drop the detailed look at the game's next expansion, the more harm it is going to do to their core business. It's important for them to recognize that attention will turn elsewhere, and such bleeding can only be stopped by introducing major new content. Now granted the content will not immediately be playable, but with the wide reach of Blizzard's communications and sites like this one, Wowhead, Twitch, and MMO-Champion, the attraction of the game will keep pace at the necessary levels while we then wait for release.

What's concerning me more is that while we know the release of Warlords is slated for Fall 2014, there is plenty of wiggle room to make that as late as possible.

If this beta lasts as long as others have, then we're not likely to see the release until August or September at this point. When we reach towards a year of current end-game content, that will have been way too long. That year mark will come on September 9, 2014. The amount of people that will unsubscribe and not bother with WoW again will hurt Blizzard's bottom line, and no amount of new content will bring them back when their attention is firmly placed in another franchise with another company.

So, the eternal question ... when is this slow news week month going to end? Is the beta actually soon, or do we all need to get ready to grind SoO for the next six to nine months?

Your thoughts, dear reader, are always appreciated.