Bad publicity is not as good as good publicity, but it is better than no publicity at all. As Seth Godin often points out "Being safe is risky".

If you wish to make a pre-launch buzz, try it in a controlled environment. A strategy I used was to aim for foreign startup blogs (mandarin, spanish, french, etc) instead of western ones. Their reviews gave me a leg up on the feedback I should anticipate from western bloggers.

Since the initial buzz I generated centered around foreign bloggers, I did not risk losing my reputation in front of the big name Web 2.0 startup bloggers. I took my startup to the west only after I was satisified with the feedback.