Having worked in several very active R&D departments in highly competitive industries, I have seen that it’s not uncommon for sonsumers of very popular products to write to the manufacturers with suggestions for new products or improvements to existing ones. Under these circumstances, it’s not unusual for such a suggestion to be close to something that is already in internal development. In cases like this, a company could face a lawsuit from a suggestor claiming that her idea was stolen by the company for profit.

Under these circumstances, it is routine for the legal department to send a form letter similar to the one received by the young Ms. O’Gorman (her age probably did not figure into this).

In the long run, it is better for companies with a heavy R&D commitment to reject outside suggestions out of hand rather than face lawsuit after lawsuit.

Judging from the other comments here, it seems as if the 102nd Dumbest Moment in Business was compiling this list.

http://musically.com/blog/2008/10/15/exclusive-warner-chappell-reveals-radioheads-in-rainbows-pot-of-gold/

Perhaps CNN should add dumb moment #102 to the list: CNN gets caught making up facts to suit itself (again).

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/news/146529-radioheads-in-rainbows-successes-revealed

Look at it this way: they allowed people to get their album for free, and 38% of people chose to pay for it. Many artists who sell more albums than Radiohead would not get that kind of profit from the same venture. That’s not to even talk about how much more money they’re getting and the publicity it’s generating (which I see other people have mentioned), or how many people bought the discbox for 40 pounds.

not even regarding the fact that 40% bought the record for £6 (and more), you’re forgetting they released the discbox which was £40 and sold out entirely, of which there was 100,000 apparently sold. now, because they didn’t use a middle man, i think their profit margin on this would be much higher than if they had used a record comapny.

you also failed to mention the fact that the album was realeased conventionally on record labels as well, and that in the majority of countries it was released it got within the top 3, and in a lot of cases took the number 1 spot.

not to mention the massive publicity the band received for the album.

i think the only thing you can call dumb here is the placement of this particular business move in your list.

Now, say 100 people download the album. According to the link, about 40% paid $6, for a total of $240. I’d be willing to say they got half of that instead of 20%, since they did not have a label, so a total of $140.

This means if there were the same amount of downloads in both cases, they took a 30% loss. However, most of the people who paid nothing wouldn’t have paid for the mp3’s in the first place – so there would be less iTunes downloads. And – the fact that you could pay $6 for the best album of the year means that even fairweather fans with a good conscience would be more likely to buy it… meaning they likely sold more.

Plus it’s all about exposure… they will probably sell 200,000 $50 concert tickets on this tour.

Wow . . . sounds horrible! What a mistake! I mean they should have remained pawns for a record label, settled for less money and lost their musical individuality.

Fortune’s article should be renamed to 102 Dumbest Moments in Business and they should place themselves in the number 1 spot for such absurdity.

Mars recently funded a deadly experiment on rats to determine the effects of chocolate ingredients on their blood vessels. Experimenters force-fed the rats by shoving plastic tubes down their throats and then cut open the rats’ legs to expose an artery, which was clamped shut to block blood flow. After the experiment, the animals were killed. Mars has also funded cruel experiments in which mice were fed a candy ingredient and forced to swim in a pool of a water mixed with white paint. The mice had to find a hidden platform to avoid drowning, only to be killed and dissected later on. In yet another experiment supported by Mars, rats were fed cocoa and anesthetized with carbon dioxide so that their blood could be collected by injecting a needle directly into their hearts, which can lead to internal bleeding and other deadly complications.”