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Apropos of that but not much else, I'm still peeved that they left blast-ended skrewts out of the movies.

Things like Wikipedia, you'd have to refer to a page in the history; the content is always being changed.

Books change too, just more slowly. If I refer to a print encyclopedia, I better at least refer to a specific year, the article may be updated next year. It can even be a problem for fiction. If you don't cite publisher and publication location, and you cite that Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire contains references to "pudding" and "biscuits" anyone checking your citation in the US release will be unable to confirm it. Rowling made changes after the books were published, a good reminder to the importance of publication year and edition number.

Things like Wikipedia, you'd have to refer to a page in the history; the content is always being changed.

Books change too, just more slowly. If I refer to a print encyclopedia, I better at least refer to a specific year, the article may be updated next year. It can even be a problem for fiction. If you don't cite publisher and publication location, and you cite that Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire contains references to "pudding" and "biscuits" anyone checking your citation in the US release will be unable to confirm it. Rowling made changes after the books were published, a good reminder to the importance of publication year and edition number.

Have you read the work in question? And have you read the encyclopedias that already exist regarding Harry Potter that Rowling's corporate masters have chosen not to sue (for comparison's sake)?

Actually, the encyclopedia is currently available as a blog/website, and I have taken a look at it. It's the Harry Potter Lexicon.

As to encyclopedias they have chosen not to sue, I've certainly looked at some of the other books that they haven't, like the Complete Idiot's Guide to Harry Potter (which has a lot more on folklore and mythology as a basis for ideas) and Quidditch Through the Ages (which was put out by her publisher, so I assume was personally okayed.) To me, it's a matter of degree how much originality and analysis was put into it. While the owner of the Lexicon put a lot of work into it, much of it is what Rowling wrote reorganized but not necessarily analyzed in any way. (Of course, maybe I had really bad luck in what pages I chose to look at but the ones I did had no analysis at all.)

Don't get me wrong--I think it's a beautiful work, and if done with her permission would be fantastic. As fanfic, it's amazing. But if I'd created HP, I'd probably go to court over it, too.

No, it's 3300 out of 4500, in other words a mere 26% original work; the linked to page is *internal*, not external.

I am not a Harry Potter aficionado. I've never read a book in the series. This topic has been sufficiently raked over the coals from a legal perspective by people who know better than me.

I do know that derivation is one source of creativity. It's a tricky source - get too formulaic + too derivative while writing a song or a story, and it can bomb out the original idea.

This can even be true for authoring or reading /. posts. Most days, my eyes roll on the classic 1.xxxx 2.yyyy 3.??? 4.Profit!, but every once in a while, i"m knee slapping from the gut up.

Derivative works *can* be nothing but a cultural drag/dupe. However, they also can be a support for the interested reader, an impetus for a whole 'culture of xxx' thing that creates a previously unimagined phenomena.

I read the lexicon site for a while tonight. It's pretty damn cool (but I like that sort of thing (shameless plug for Simon Winchester and the OED).

I don't care how much money Rowling has already made - meaningless to me. I only care that she made the characters and settings up should someone appropriate the characters for the writing of another fictional story in a similar setting.

However, a work which slices and dices the facts, foibles & follies of an existing fictional story must, by definition, overlap the detail and content of the original work. That's what it is all *about*.

More importantly, it affords an opportunity for the author's work to step out front of the cultural curtain and make their work not just a story, but a view into the cultural details of our present-day world. Foolish to skip out on that one ...

Rolwings is missing a major opportunity here, perhaps on the bad advice of a lawyer obliged, by a crappy IP law landscape, to offer a good legal interpretation. Major bummer, but at the end of the day she's the one making the money call rather than the cultural call.

So you are saying that every site like this should be sued by the IP owner?

The Harry Potter Lexicon is no different than Gateworld and every other site out there that is basically a well done fan site.

She should be happy that there is that much interest in her books and that the site isn't some half-assed, inaccurate piece of crap.

What's next, will she sue Wikipedia over their Harry Potter pages?

Well sucks to be her because after looking at the wiki which they want to re-package it looks like fair use to me. I can't see any large blobs of text taken from the book.

The only reason she is putting up this lawsuit is because she wants to re-package the wiki herself which is probably why she was contributing to it in the first place.

It works in Opera too. I posted that earlier. It's probably just IE. One of those crazy non-webstandard things. Disable right click?? WTF??

But on the links with the books like this one... http://www.hp-lexicon.org/about/books/book_fb.html

It won't let you copy by right clicking in IE. Most of the rest of the site lets you right click and copy it's just the sections where he seems to quote from books.

It's only certain parts of the website. Like if you click on the books. http://www.hp-lexicon.org/about/books/book_fb.html [hp-lexicon.org] Try that link in IE and you get the message "copyright 2001-2006 The Harry Potter Lexicon"

It's only certain parts of the website. Like if you click on the books.

http://www.hp-lexicon.org/about/books/book_fb.html

Try that link in IE and you get the message "copyright 2001-2006 The Harry Potter Lexicon"

Burns going down, but works nicely.

Your post reminded me of one still-dangling plot thread. There's still a 24-hour gap in the timeline of events between the time Hagrid took Harry from Godric's Hollow, to when he shows up to meet Dumbledore at Privet Drive.

no, the Weasley's clock...

  Heaven forbid that the English have to deal with crappy American speak, when millions of Americans read Harry Potter daily.

But most of them are not reading the texts as they were published in the U.K. Publishers are stupid on both sides of the pond, unfortunately.

Reeta Skeeter. Anyone else had that association?

For those who never saw the advert, an explanation of sorts

mmm... Dime

Some games have plot (and in exceptional cases about as good as your average fantasy book). Why shouldn't they be able to delay? Some (though not all) of the books we still read as great literature were edited and rescripted for 20 years. Screw cash flow and give me quality!