If the choice is between having a meetup at the local Burger King or not having a GB World Tour, I'll take the World Tour every time.
I think the balancing act of that is that Jeff/GB should stipulate that they're going to say things that the PR people may/may not like but that's the nature of their site and readers enjoy that. If the PR people are willing to go along with that, then they may benefit more than stiffling Jeff by not letting him trash the product as a joke/serious bit in those aspects.
But that won't really ever happen because PR is scared to death of letting reviewers speak openly about what they think of something.