Rumors have been floating around the internet today concerning a ‘hacker’ obtaining a digital copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows from a Bloomsbury computer and posting the alleged ending on the web. Reuters is reporting this evening that a Bloomsbury spokesperson ‘declined comment on the hacker’s claims,’ while Kyle Good, a spokesperson for US publishers Scholastic, is warning readers ‘to be skeptical about anything on the Web that claims to have inside information on the book’s plot’ saying:
“There is a whole lot of junk flying around,” she said. “Consider this one more theory.”
It is highly unlikely that any documents containing information as well protected as the seventh Harry Potter book would be on a Bloomsbury computer and as Trend Micro, a computer security company, spokesman David Perry was noted as saying:
“We’ve had hypes like this on the last couple of Harry Potter books… There is a very high level of spurious information in the hacker world.”
ABSOLUTELY LAME. I will eat the sorting hat if any of it is near true. One commenter said that it looks like a 10 year old wrote it. I would disagree, I think a 10 year old could write something better. I read it and immediately thought what udder garbage and how un-JKR. It looks like some poser wanting his 15 minutes of fame.
Marianne, ONTD stands for Oh No They Didn’t!, and it is a celebrity gossip community on LJ.
blah, After coming on here, I too agree that it is fake. To me, that person just picked the three biggest characters. Though, I’m now swearing off LJ and comments on here and MuggleNet.
in my opinion its just another theory, i do wonder is this Gabril person right in the head. for me personally its not the ending that is important in the Harry potter books but the world that it creates. Iv read the books so many times that iv lost count and its not the ending or the advents that i love but its the world. so for me this is simply another flash in the pan.
I read it. I find the spoiler to be a possible-but not probable-ending. Anyway, I’m glad I read it because now I won’t be tempted to skip to the end like I did with HBP.
I read it. It’s a crock. Suffice it to say that some of it is just not consistent with the HP world.
Like (this is so stupid it can’t be considered a spoiler!!!) the “hacker’s” reference to a character making horcruxes for profit—please, how is that possible? A wizard has to make his own horcrux, and it wouldn’t be useful to anyone else! Who’s the seller? Who’s the consumer? Ridiculous! So that example alone demonstrates that it’s a bunch of hooey.
I read it, and all I could think was “Is this it? This is what the big deal’s about?”
That was the dumbest thing I’ve ever read in my life…
It was laughable really.
I have absolutely no worries that DH will go down anything like that.
(My 8 year old could do a better ending than that…so could my 2 year old for that matter…)
-B
The post was posted to a mailing list on one of the bigger security vulnerability sites. The site itself doesn’t require the extra traffic generated by this, so it’s unlikely to be to generate traffic.
At the end of the day, only 3 groups of people know if he’s telling the truth – ‘Gabriel’, JK Rowling and people at Bloomsbury.
As for the data being stored on a PC, of course it is! It’s probably on some central fileserver, nice and accessible to hundreds of employees and in the inboxes and outboxes of various employees. If you read the poast by ‘Gabriel’ then he says it was the age old send someone an email with a link to a site, which then allows him access to the computer. So it IS possible that he did get access to it.
As for the other fakes floating around, probably fanfiction – it’s happened with all the other previous releases.
After reading the news, I really did think it was authentic. But after reading the first paragraph, I knew it was unreal. The ending is poor.
But, the “book” does have some good theories.
I’m also glad that Leaky included this piece of news on their website finally, since this had been doing the rounds on other sites and local papers.
:) less than a month!
I just happened to google Deathly Hallows a couple of hours after the first news reports came out about this… You know what they say about curiousity, I had to read it; couldn’t help myself.
I think it’s unfair to say that people who read spoilers aren’t real fans, we’re just human. I honestly don’t think this one is the least bit true, but even if it was it wouldn’t bother me; I’m still going to dress up like a wizard on July 21 and wait outside of Target to get my copy. Yes Target, because there’s never much of a line. Spoilers are a little bit like cheesecake though, you can’t resist them at the time but half a cheesecake later you’re feeling a bit ill and worrying about your thighs… Being spoiled isn’t nice, but some of us just can’t help ourselves; though we feel guilty afterwards.
TLC, your title is completely misleading. No body knows for sure it’s not a hoax. I mean, Bloomsbury declining comment makes the whole thing sound serious. I have to say, that when reading your title I thought it was safe to see those fake spoilers, and I did read the first line but then realized it might be risky and stopped right away. My DH might already has been spioled. JK… put an end to this!
I think its clear why Bloomsbury wont comment. If they say this is “not what happens” you will know that at least some of the characters that he claims dies will survive, and that too will ruin the experience. So the best thing they could do is not to comment! Its fake. its no way he could have hacked it. But when the books are shipped you can BET someone will know the ending and spoil it for us so stay away from any other site than this one!
and mugglenet I guess ;)
"You rose magnificently to the challenge that face you, and sooner -- much sooner -- than I had anticipated, you found yourself face-to-face with Voldemort. You survived again. You did more. You delayed his return to full power and strength. You fought a
ABSOLUTELY LAME. I will eat the sorting hat if any of it is near true. One commenter said that it looks like a 10 year old wrote it. I would disagree, I think a 10 year old could write something better. I read it and immediately thought what udder garbage and how un-JKR. It looks like some poser wanting his 15 minutes of fame.