@Deep, it looks like we are just going to have to agree to disagree on the value of embodying a musical performance in a physical object. Of course in some ways it's not that different. Whether your ones and zeros are embodied on a plastic disc, a hard drive or an ipod or chip, they have to be embodied somewhere. It's just that the digital download will not have a very long life stored on magnetic media.
As a side note, the Dead Sea Scrolls are on display at the Science Museum here. It's amazing to see ideas embodied in a tangible form that is 2000 years old. I wonder where our ones and zeros will be even 100 years from now if they are all stored on hard drives and ipods? It's something I hope the archivists of the world are dealing with.
As far as leaks go, time is needed to arrange all the promo, TV and radio appearances, print media, etc. to coincide with the album release. I honestly don't think there is a way to avoid leaks unless you release it with most of the promo lagging behind. Even then, a significant number of people will have already had access to the music in order to ready it for release. I don't think leaks are easily preventable in any case. There's too many people to control, and the digital medium and the internet make it so easy to do. I actually think they did a pretty good job this time around. We're only talking a few weeks in this case. It could have been much worse.
Edit: I was looking on the American Amazon and I noticed this:
UEDS is ranked accordingly in the following music categories; #99 in World, #62 in Europe, #9 in Continental Europe and #3 in France. It's ranked #1318 overall. Now these may not be great numbers, but consider that this is an Alizée pre-order album on an American site that sells hundreds of thousands of different albums. These numbers can change dramatically and frequently, but I'm not sure she has been this high in ranking before. Let's hope a trend is developing. A few days ago she was above 9000 overall.