Here's another example of how the RIAA is letting the legal department be the marketing/PR wing for the music industry - and how sometimes, they run smack into the actual marketing and PR group:

Launch Radio Networks reports: The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which has become notorious for suing anyone from high school students to retirees for downloading music from the web, has gone after web sites such as Idolator that have posted leaked songs from the upcoming NINE INCH NAILS album, "Year Zero". The problem, however, is that the tracks were leaked intentionally. Several songs from the album were left on computer hard drives at venues on the band's current European tour, with fans finding and posting them on the web for others to download and swap. According to Billboard.com, the RIAA sent cease-and-desist emails to web sites that posted the tracks, leading one industry source to say, "These f***ing idiots are going after a campaign that the label signed off on."

It must be very, very hard to be a PR flack for a studio right now - half or more of your time has to be spent trying to explain why your legal department is trying to sue your customer base...

Technorati Tags: marketing, PR