J.K. Rowling sues fans over Lexicon publication

[deccan]

Since this forum seems to love arguments over i.p., I thought this might be an interesting read:

Why she should lose her copyright lawsuit against the Harry Potter Lexicon. (http://www.slate.com/id/2181776)

Basically fans who run a lexicon website of terms in the Harry Potter universe tries to get it published. Rowling and her publishers sue them.

[Siren]

The number of HP references in that article would make the Lexicon necessary for someone who hasn't read any of the books...

[Angie Gallant]

If you have ever read the Lexicon website it is a collection of giant quotes from the book, and articles that the owner of the site did not write. He does not have permission to reprint huge amounts of text from the original source, nor did he ask for permission to print any of the articles on the site. Also, his publisher is the biggest dink in the universe.


Edit: As evidence of said dinkery, the publisher claims that they need to have the right to publish this book so that starving children in Africa without access to the internet can spend $25 to have a Harry Potter reference book. Also, Rowling is so rich that she doesn't have the right to make money anymore, and once she finished writing the books she lost her copyrights.

[Angie Gallant]

An update that probably no one but I care about, the trial has started and Rowling's team revealed that 91% of the Lexicon book is unattributed quotes of her material. Including every bit of text that was published in the two side books that she put out and donated 100% of the proceeds to charity.

[Hanacker]

Apparently Warner Brothers is suing (http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/009200804131101.htm) the creators of the movie Troll (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(film)), a 1986 film featuring a magic-using, troll-fighting character named Harry Potter Jr., because they're making a remake and are worried they're going to infringe on Warner Brother's / Rowling's Harry Potter character. That seems terribly backwards to me.

[Theodore Rex DX]

Rowling has already publically talked about releasing a Potter dictionary/fact book after the series was over ... the proceeds of which would go to charity. Dude has got zero moral high ground here.

[Sol Invictus]

Dude is just trying to make a buck off Rowling's hard work. I may not like her books but that doesn't make what he's doing right in any sort of way. He can go play in traffic.

[Sarkus]

What swayed me was that she has no problem with the website, she just doesn't want it turned into a book.

The one thing I wonder is what grounds the guy thought he had to stand on. I can't think of any other franchise where a third party has been allowed to publish a reference without official approval.

[Jamie Madigan]

Publishing a reference work is okay and fine. Just about any work of literary criticism and scholarly research falls into this category and it happens all the time. What seems to be at issue is reprinting great swaths of the original source (especially if that 91% figure is right), which is not at all necessary for scholarly reference and flops into copyright infringement land.

[BennyProfane]

Yeah, as nearly as I can tell (IANAL, just an academic who publishes) the guy had a pretty good case to win if he wasn't cribbing her work, but if he is, and not giving attribution, then he's screwed.

[Bahimiron]

When the seventh book was published Rowling made it pretty clear she intended to follow it up with a lexicon that would contain more details on certain aspects of the wizarding world. I donno how anyone can be surprised that she and her publishers would defend their right to be the only such guide out there by shutting down some fan's attempt at beating her to the punch.

[cliffski]

It's a sad sign that so many news outlets are taking the side of the 'fan' against the author. It seems that 'IP holder' is the new 'evil' to some people, although they only ever use examples where the IP holder in question is fabulously rich. It's sad to see them do it in this case, where the IP holder is generally reckoned to be on the side of good and tolerance, and dedication to her fans.
I hope he loses big time and has serious legal fees to pay. I also hope the good reasons WHY he lost are made clear, and not turned into a pathetic "oh noes teh mafia have won!!!" style whine.

[Angie Gallant]

There's a very good analysis of the case by a contract lawyer here. (http://praetorianguard.livejournal.com/279321.html) I'm sure it's pretty tl;dr for many people, but the final section on how the contract between writer and publisher is set to totally fuck over the writer is pretty interesting.

[cliffski]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7349913.stm

Steven Vander Ark said his only goal was to celebrate Rowling, sitting in front of him, who he called a "genius".

Mr Vander Ark said he was initially against the idea, partly because he thought it would violate copyright law, but was reassured by RDR that they could publish legally.

The publishers should be in the court, not this fanboy.

[Angie Gallant]

The publishers are in court. The lawsuit is not JKR vs Steve. It's WB vs RDR Publishing. It just so happens that if RDR loses this case, they can turn around and sue the fanboy for everything he's worth.

[cliffski]

That sucks :(

[Jamie Madigan]

The 50-year-old librarian said he had read every Harry Potter book "30 or 40 times" and read every article ever written about Rowling.
Yeee...

On Monday, Rowling told the court she had stopped work on a new novel because her legal concerns had "decimated my creative work".
Ha, that's great. Blaming the guy for delaying the release of new Potterverse stuff (even if it's just implied) is a nice way of turning the fan community against him.

[Bill]

When the seventh book was published Rowling made it pretty clear she intended to follow it up with a lexicon that would contain more details on certain aspects of the wizarding world. I donno how anyone can be surprised that she and her publishers would defend their right to be the only such guide out there by shutting down some fan's attempt at beating her to the punch.

I'd normally think that the fan is in the right to create what's essentially a guide or critique of her work, if the content is virtually all just lifted directly from Rowling's books then I don't think it qualifies. But I don't see how her future plans to publish a lexicon should have anything to do with this suit.

[Bahimiron]

But I don't see how her future plans to publish a lexicon should have anything to do with this suit.

Her future plans do not come into it in a legal sense. She would have the right, and be in the right, to sue no matter what. Her intent to publish a lexicon would come into it because it would make her, and her publishers, far more likely to sue. After all, if they're going to publish a lexicon, they wouldn't want there to already be one in the market when they release theirs.

[Dave47]

It's a sad sign that so many news outlets are taking the side of the 'fan' against the author. It seems that 'IP holder' is the new 'evil' to some people, although they only ever use examples where the IP holder in question is fabulously rich. It's sad to see them do it in this case, where the IP holder is generally reckoned to be on the side of good and tolerance, and dedication to her fans.
I hope he loses big time and has serious legal fees to pay. I also hope the good reasons WHY he lost are made clear, and not turned into a pathetic "oh noes teh mafia have won!!!" style whine.
I’ll be the first to admit that the idea / expression distinction that forms the basis of Supreme Court copyright jurisprudence doesn’t make a lot of sense. That said, the idea / expression distinction is supported by both law and precedent, so like it or not, we’re stuck with it.

J.K. Rowling’s statements in court have really bothered me: she seems convinced that, because she created the Harry Potter universe, she should have control over its underlying ideas. That’s just wrong. Her broad view of control threatens not just this book, but the existence of all internet fan sites and third-party literary resources. I think a lot of the media push-back against Rowling comes not from a “boo rich person!” position, but instead from an understanding that journalism involve talking about other people’s ideas, and that this is the sort of thing that must remain legal.

That said, if the plaintiff’s “91% plagiarized!” statistic is accurate, then this may turn out to be a rather straightforward case. Quotes are the clearest example of using “expression” instead of merely “ideas.” Using quotes in summaries and criticisms can be defended as fair use, but the fair use guidelines in the copyright code specifically mention the “amount and substantiality” of the excerpts used as one of the factors that are important in evaluating a fair use claim.

[Angie Gallant]

You may feel her statements in court mean that she feels that way, Dave, but she is widely known as one of the most permissive authors out there. She acknowledges and encourages fan-works such as fanfic and fanart as long as they don't plagiarize her exact words. She really goes out of her way to embrace her fans. She praises fansites like the Lexicon, allows filk bands like Wizard Rock to prosper and gives them encouragement.

Now if you want an author who believes in really broad control, look to Anne Rice, who shuts down anything that even vaguely looks like fandom creativity using her properties.

[Angie Gallant]

RISE FROM YOUR GRAVE:

The Honorable Judge Rpattz has delivered his verdict in this case, and basically told RDR and Steve Van Der Ark "LOL NO." (http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/potterdecision.pdf) His wording made it clear that he was not trying to turn this into a precedent-setting case and ruling only on the case at hand. That might be enough for the Stanford Fair Use Project to dump RDR and go look for another case to champion.

[Marged]

That's really frustrating news.

[Angie Gallant]

There is no reason for it to be frustrating news. 90% of the book was unattributed quotes of Rowling's work.

[Marged]

As far as I can tell, they weren't direct quotes - it seems like that 90% figure refers to any information taken from the books, such as plot summaries, paraphrasing events, and using the information and words she created for the series. That's different than straight quotes. And even if they were direct word for word quotations it seems to me that it should be legal, because works of criticism are just different beasts than novels, and arranging the information and critiquing it (even if it's 10%) is so different from a novelistic adaptation (which is covered under copyright law).

To my admittedly un-lawyerly eyes, it seems as though she's attempting to corner the market on Harry Potter reference works and that's just not protected under copyright law. (And if it is, it shouldn't be.)

[Angie Gallant]

Read the judgment. The judge specifically says that a Lexicon work would be fair use if the work was more transformative. Lifting whole sections of text unchanged and dropping them into your book without commentary is not transformative, which is what was happening in this case. Pretty much the entirety of the two companion books were copied without changes or commentary.

There are several Harry Potter reference works (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=harry+potter+encyclopedia&x=0&y=0) on the market, some of which Rowling has stated that she likes and some which she feels are poor works, but it was only this specific one she took to court.

[Marged]

I'm reading it! This is hilarious:

Defendent pursued only its defenses and affirmative defenses of copyright fair use under 17 U.S.C. 107 copyright misuse, and unclean hands.

[Troy S Goodfellow]

And the judge explicitly said that Rowling does not have a monopoly on Potter reference works.

Notwithstanding Rowling's public statements of her intentions to publish her own encyclopedia, the market for reference guides to the Harry Potter works is not exclusively hers to exploit or license, no matter the commercial success attributable to the popularity of the original works.

The decision is pretty clear that Van Ark clearly had the right to make an encyclopedia, but the extended copy/pasting of unique turns of phrase and almost entire lifting from Rowling's Quidditch and Dragon books puts his Lexicon beyond fair use.

Troy

[Angie Gallant]

He seemed to be pretty funny when the trial was going on. The judge didn't have a lot of tolerance for either side blowing things out of proportion and didn't have a problem shutting them down if they tried.

Edit: And here is Rowling's response to the ruling.

"I took no pleasure at all in bringing legal action and am delighted that this issue has been resolved favourably. I went to court to uphold the right of authors everywhere to protect their own original work. The court has upheld that right.

The proposed book took an enormous amount of my work and added virtually no original commentary of its own. Now the court has ordered that it must not be published.

Many books have been published which offer original insights into the world of Harry Potter. The Lexicon just is not one of them."

[Bahimiron]

JK Rowling is supposed to be a writer but she can't bother to spell 'favorably' correctly when she's talking? Man, I'm not sure I want my kids exposed to her anymore. :(

[Pogue Mahone]

Damn comedians.

[Damien Neil]

JK Rowling is supposed to be a writer but she can't bother to spell 'favorably' correctly when she's talking? Man, I'm not sure I want my kids exposed to her anymore. :(

This is possibly the best troll in the venerable alt.folklore.urban tradition that I've seen in years. I doff my hat to you, sit.

[Destarius]

Read the judgment, sounds pretty reasonable.