Agreed re: press releases. They're still used, not sure how effective depending on the audience, but they need to be done right. It's not terribly expensive either.
It's disappointing to see how much stuff gets announced here and how little of it is still alive a year later.
It can take quite a while before your real audience has found you, viral elements help but are no guarantee of a significantly easier process, even if they can cut the time it takes to get to the level of 'ramen profitability'.
And that's all assuming you make no critical mistakes, which can set you back weeks or months.
Endurance is far more important than talent in this phase and I think that is something that ought to be made much more clear. If the expectations are more realistic I think people would find it in themselves to go the distance.
Unrealistic expectations are killing.