The New York Times reported on Thursday on the decision of some record labels to hold off on releasing new singles to digital services like iTunes, for fear they will cannibalize sales of more-profitable full-albums. Island Def Jam claims this strategy helped its artist Ne-Yo, whose single “So Sick” was released early to radio but not iTunes, and whose album “In My Own Words” went on to open at No. 1 with sales of over 301,000 copies. “If you know you have something of depth, you have to be careful about how you bring it into the marketplace,” Island Def Jam COO Steve Bartels told The Times. “If everything is up and gone before you have a chance to listen to the album, what do you have?” However, “So Sick” was also downloaded 3.4 million times from free file-sharing services during its opening week. “The labels are shooting themselves in the foot,” Rhapsody executive editor Tim Quirk told The Times. “You need to take advantage of every possible opportunity for people to pay in legitimate ways_ Every single track that you are worried about is available for free whether you want it to be or not.”