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Tanya Grotter and the Magic Double Bass
Slate has a piece about Harry Potter and copyright worldwide that is a disguised call for copyright reform. Well written, well argued, extremely good argument, won't be picked up anywhere else.
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It's pretty sad. Rowling always said she would NEVER sell the rights to Harry Potter. Now if you look at he books, there's a small message on the copyright page saying that Time Warner own the rights to all the character names and likenesses.
The fact she's an unmitigated sellout aside, Rowling (I have no problem with people making money from their creations, but do NOT take the moral high ground and say you'll never sell the rights, then in the same breath be a media whore who gives their soul to the nearest media behemoth), along with Time-Warner, are becoming cease-and-desist junkies of the highest order. MANY fansites are being shut down.
On the one hand, I think that anyone who wants to publish a 'Star Trek' or 'Star Wars' book should be required to ok it first with the owners of those franchises.
BUT....
If I want to write a sci-fi which takes place in a future 'confederation' with an egotistical Captain 'Church', and a navigation officer called 'Prok' who is annoyingly logical, well that should be ok.
No-one is going to mistake it for the original, but by using some of the same background, I ease the readers immersion into the story, and possibly extend the original in interesting ways.
Note: This is what the Potter books already do, they're based on any number of Boys Own Adventure stories, where 3 or so schoolfriends have all sorts of adventures while dodging crotchety old school-masters, etc.
Quidquid Latine dictum sit, altum videtur (anything said in Latin sounds important)
Basically, the Potter books aren't 100% original, nor are they as well written as their predecessors. They all have a very linear plot with Harry in every scene - compare The Two Towers where there are three simultaneous stories- and they're relentlessly literal where they could be surreal. Masefield's stuff is amazingly surreal, but then he *was* Poet Laureate.
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
He first ignores the difference between inspired by and derivative works, lumping in Tonya Grotter (which with the data given may or may not be a derivative work) with Harry Potter in Calcutta.
Second, he doesn't consider any of the logical consequences of ending derivative work protection, except for a brief consideration of movie rights.
For example, if international copyright is changed to allow Harry Potter in Calcutta, certainly there's no obvious reason why an unauthorized Harry Potter in New York shouldn't be similarly allowed. Or an alternate Harry Potter 6 book, for that matter.
Translations are derivative works, not the original; all translation is paraphrase. Should a translation of a Rowling Harry Potter into French not pay royalties to her? How about a mere English-languge paraphrase?
Similarly, a movie of the first Harry Potter is not a copy of the book but just a derivative work, and any other version of the film shot by a different studio isn't a copy, either. Should Disney be allowed to suddenly start making its own Harry Potter films based directly on the books?
Moron. He doesn't even raise the questions.
I've been planning on writing someting about just this subject for a while. This is the natural situation, if you think about creativity.
How does creative stuff happen? Some author or musician or whatever really digs something, and feels inspired, and writes something that features all the stuff he digs.
You might create a ripping bluegrass tune in the style of Flatt and Scrugs, or if you're Mr. Bungle, mix surf music with death metal. If you're a writer, maybe you will create an epic like the great Finnish epics, only set in a world of your own creation, or maybe a world where the ancient Greek gods are all immortal personifications, updated for the modern age. Maybe you'll write a story where refugees from Troy found the Roman empire. Maybe you'll write a story about a nerdy boy who becomes a great magician, but who doesn't fight the demon Barbatos and an evil possible future version of himself.
In the days before oppressive copyright, this was the norm. The world of fiction was a big pot of cool stuff and everyone worked out of it. To this day, the rich mythical history of past civilizations shape our current world.
Terry Pratchett said this, and I think it's interesting:
'Books in a genre may well remind you of other books in that genre. This is allowed. If it wasn't, H G Wells would have been the only person permitted to write about time machines. Being a fantasy writer is like being allowed to sit around a big bubbling pot, a stew made up of everything that's gone before. You're allowed to take a certain amount of stuff out, and you don't object if it turns out that you're putting stuff in, too. And so the stew bubbles on. There are only two crimes: one is to claim that the pot is yours, and that the other is to claim that there is no pot.'
He wasn't talking about taking specifics like Harry Potter's name and rough history, but such distinctions are slight and, in my opinion, completely unimportant.
I've read the book series about Tanya Grotter (there is more than one) while I was in Russia not too long ago.
Let me say this about the book. It is not the same as Harry Potter in anyway shape or form. It simply uses similar names and items. The storyline itself is different enough that I would not consider it a copyright violation.
What Tanya and her friends are doing - is trying to capitalize on the market potential of Harry Potter. A Harry Potter Book in Kazan, Russia costs about 140 Rubles (4 dollars) while you can buy a Tanya Grotter for slightly cheaper - 100 Rubles (3 dollars). Since the names are somewhat similar and the covers (of the Harry Potter Books and Tanya Grotter Books) both have the same style of artwork, a good many people buy the Tanya Grotter book as it is cheaper (and written by a Russian, meaning understandable, FYI - the Harry Potter books don't transalate well at all, Just how do you say muggle in a foreign language?)
This of course ticks off the Harry Potter People, but I don't think you can Tanya Grotter for blatant copyright violations (other than similar names)...
There is always a frontier where there is an open and willing mind