He Run This Town

Jay-Z Leaks His Own Album On Purpose

Samsung pays $5 million for first million copies.

For $5 million, you might have leaked it too. One million copies of Jay-Z’s newest album, the humbly named Magna Carta Holy Grail, became available to Samsung Galaxy owners Thursday, 72 hours before the album hits store shelves—essentially guaranteeing it platinum status before it’s even released. The rapper was paid $5 million by Samsung for the deal, in which the company paid for 1 million copies of the album to give away to customers. The cherry on top? This guarantees Jay-Z the best opening-week sales figures of his career (even better than the opening-week sales of his first four albums combined). It won’t count for chart placement though: Billboard isn’t counting the 1 million Samsung copies toward the album’s total sales.