Well it seems Free Press had wrong information, as Blizzard has said offically on their forums that the game isn't ready to ship yet, here is the small remark by a Blizzard staff member:
We appreciate everyone's interest in determining when World of Warcraft will ship, but while we are rapidly approaching the open beta period and we are confident that we will meet our goal of shipping the game before the end of this year, nailing down an exact ship date is a little more complicated due to a number of factors. As soon as we have a specific date to announce, we will be excited to share the news with everyone. Please don't consider any announced release dates official until such an announcement comes from Blizzard. This is true for all announcements related to Blizzard games.
News source: World of Warcraft Forums
