PRANK OF THE WEEK: It’s amazing what...

PRANK OF THE WEEK: It’s amazing what you can find thumbing through the Business Opportunities classified ad section of the Wall Street Journal. Millions of latex gloves from Malaysia. Producing oil wells. An Idaho resort. The Scotti Bros. record company. A Denver-area car wash. . . .

Wait a minute--Scotti Bros. Records? For sale??? That’s what an ad said in the Nov. 17 edition of the Journal, offering up the CBS-distributed label, which has such stars as John Cafferty, Survivor and Weird Al Yankovic. “Top name acts--big sales volume,” the ad boasted. “Liquidating assets. Must sell at tremendous loss. Will consider best offer.” Listed below was the name John Musso (the label’s president) and the company’s West Coast phone number.

Don’t whip out your checkbook--the ad was a hoax. But Scotti Bros. general counsel Leonard Breijo acknowledged that the company received “numerous” queries from callers assuming it was legitimate. “We really have no idea who did it,” Breijo said. “Obviously it’s totally false. But we’re trying to see the humor in it.”

What especially peeved Breijo was that the Journal ran the ad without checking out its authenticity. “I find it hard to believe that such a respected publication could take an ad like that over the phone without checking it out,” he said, noting that the Journal is sending a letter of apology. “I spoke to the classified ad department who told me they routinely take small ads over the phone. In fact, if I hadn’t called, we would’ve gotten the bill! From the way they explained it, you could just phone in and say ‘I’ve got a house for sale at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. . . .’ ”