Taken from the steam page, before you even have to click the read more button: immediate access to the alpha which currently contains the first 15 hours of the game . Be aware that it's still rough around the edges and that certain features are missing. New features and improvements will be added regularly.
You make it seem like it was some ploy from Larian, which is frankly ridiculous given that they are up front about literally everything they are offering you at this point in time, and what you can expect in the days to come and at the eventual completion of the game.
Outside of this there have been multiple sources of information about the game and it's state, and as to information about why they went early access, have a look at Swen's blog for some info about what they discussed for quite some time before giving early access a try:
http://www.lar.net/ .
Money is not this companies only language I'm afraid, you have to realize games cost money it's not ground breaking news, in fact the purpose of just about every company looking to make a profit so that they can live and continue to function, but I'm getting derailed. Sure some devs are buggering people over on early access, but the major problem with early access at the moment is misinformed entitled fools like yourself using the system without a firm understanding of, as far as I can tell at the moment, anything. Save your libel for the steam forums where most of your kind are polite enough to stay and troll without spilling over here.
