I am a fan of an Artist, who will release a new album in a few weeks. I was involved in crowdfunding the production, so I have a line of communication to the Artist (who is wonderful with fans, by the way). The Artist enthusiastically supports having the Release in MusicBrainz. They have given me a copy of the credits that will end up on the Release cover and packaging.
It seems desirable to me that MusicBrainz get a ReleaseGroup and Release entries for this album, even before the official launch date, and before the manufactured CD is in my hand. As soon as the album is released, fans will be coming to MusicBrainz to enter the release. I imagine it will help them to have mostly-right Release entries so that they just need to correct details, rather than enter everything from scratch.
A really neat win would be to pass the MBID for the digital Release to the label’s production team, for them to embed in the MP3s and FLAC files which they sell. I think it’s unlikely that I will succeed. It will probably be hard to attract the attention of the right folks at the label. Big companies have their process, and it probably doesn’t involve listening to fans about MusicBrainz. But a precondition for even trying is to have a Release entry, which defines the MBID for them to include.
So I am inclined to make Release Group, Release, and Artist entries now, in anticipation of the actual release event, using the pretty reliable information I have on hand. It will be incomplete in some respects. I do not have a catalogue number or barcode, because I imagine the label’s production people have not got to that yet. Of course we cannot know the CD discid before the CDs are manufactured. I will take responsibility for reviewing the entries after I get my physical production copy of the Release, and making any additions or corrections necessary.
Does anyone know of policy or Style Guide objections to going ahead with this, which I might not have considered?