I think it is strange that: The GTAA is not releasing information at all. The media is "finding" some information from somewhere and posting it. Fans get upset about the information. The media retracts the information. Then fans get upset at the GTAA for screwing up the entire thing.
It appears to me that the issue is more that fans want to know every detail of what is happening, and that the news media is reporting anything whether it is accurate or not. It is possible that Batt is screwing the search, but we have zero actual information. If we as fans tune out all of the internet "information", and the news media kindof-sortof-maybe "information", it will seem a lot less like things are being mishandled.