The surround speakers are actually pretty nice.

As for the comic books - well, I can take a guess at why they're offering these. First, they want to promote the comic book; that's a no-brainer. Second, I suspect that they're heading off complaints that "you only give out the cool prizes when not everybody can win!". (viz. the Winter Veil "sweepstakes" prizes, for example.) Further on that point, they may be trying to organically limit the number of entries by making the prizes not entirely appealing.

Finally, even though the bubble of the 90s has burst (and good riddance!), there are still people who collect comic books for their perceived financial value rather than because they want to read the comic. This prize appeals to those people - for whom a signed WoW comic would have the double-whammy of broad appeal (nine million accounts) and creator contact. To a collector, the signed comics really are a good prize - and if the prize goes to someone who's not a collector, expect to see it on eBay within a few days.

I suppose. Not impugning comic books, mind, but I'm reading about Blizzard giving away speakers on a Blog about Warcraft where they're giving away a $5,000 laptop. So, more a comparative "lackluster".

@3 The difference being this website was "given" a laptop by Dell as a promotion whereas Blizzard is paying for these contest prizes with their own money. There would be no $5k laptop contest if WoW Insider had to pay for the laptop out of their pocket.