U.K. Publisher Methuen does not expect to meet the scheduled April release of Steve Vander Ark’s Lexicon book, as it has been postponed pending the court’s decision.
Peter Tummons or Methuen says he is “very confident” in RDR Book’s position, but says that he does expect Warner Brothers to appeal if RDR wins. Says Tummons:
“You can never quite tell about the US appeal system, but I think we are talking about a matter of some months. Eventually, I think we will be able to publish this autumn, which might turn out to be quite good timing for us.”
Tummons would not comment on what his company might do should RD lose the case.
your right Black cat idid go a bit over board mcgonagal’s cat apologize for the name calling. Its just that this subject gets me so worked up as it does many others I must learn to copntrol my emotions better
Thank you for your polite and thoughtful reply. I appreciate your points. You said “Actually, WB’s line-by-line analysis of quotation from the HP books was unrebutted.” I haven’t finished reading the transcripts yet, and I’m not a lawyer so I don’t know the legal meaning of “unrebutted.” I do recall reading on Day 1 testimony that Hammer went back and questioned JKR a bit on what she was calling “wholesale lifting” and he was pointing out that some of the phrases she called “copying” were in fact different in some way (some would probably say a slight way, but still different.)
My opinion that I stated earlier where I said I felt the whole book was original is based on what you said here: “Their main argument is that the very nature of a reference book requires extensive copying, although they could not prove this point with any real-world examples, so their extensive copying is fair use (i.e., the “purpose” criteria of fair use law outweighs the criteria regarding “amount taken”).” I agree with that argument. The Lexicon appears to me to be a reference book, not a novel. Therefore, to me, it is original. Again, only a layman reader’s opinion.
And when I was talking about Dean Jeri Johnson’s declaration being rude, I was referring to the personal comments she made about Steve and his writing ability. It had nothing to do with the “truth” of her analysis of what constitutes the definition of a reference book, so no, the “truth” doesn’t hurt. At my work, I would never in a million years put highly personal comments like the ones she used in a supposedly professional assessment.
You said: “I find this to be a dramatically different example than when RDR completely ignored WB’s legitimate requests to view the Lexicon manuscript, which were eventually enforced in the Discovery process.” Again, I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t know how “legitimate” WB’s requests were to view the Lexicon manuscript. Was he legally required to turn them over just because they asked? Was it “rude” of him not to do so? Rapoport testified on Day 1 that it is not typically the habit of a publishing company to go around providing copies of their manuscripts to whomever asks for them. To me it seems rather like getting a warrant—if you want to see it, then file suit. Which of course WB did, and at which point Rapoport turned over the manuscript as he was legally required to do.
About WB pasting the maps and timelines and such from the Lexicon around their offices and using them… I understand that this is not a legal issue (at least, not at this point.) But I don’t agree with you that “There is no moral equivalence” though. If I were an employer such as WB, and I were using something to help me make money that someone naively did for free (such as Steve’s Lexicon), then I would feel a moral obligation to try to acknowledge or compensate him somehow for it. But that’s just me. And as I said, I was just musing about corporate mentalities, not commenting about the legality of it.
Regarding the issue of WB using the Lexicon’s maps and timelines and such in their offices, and David Heyman’s comment to Steve that the movie people used the Lexicon all the time, you said: “One has to take SVA’s word that producers actually said something like that. Sorry, but he’s been proven to not be an honest and honorable guy.”
Can you cite me the source for that proof? (Other than going by postings here on Leaky about his personal life, I mean.) In going over the testimony and information relevant to this case, I haven’t seen anything that proves he’s lied about anything to do with this case. He testified to the WB/Heyman thing under oath on the stand; I see no reason to disbelieve him, but if you know of a source I would be glad to hear it. I don’t know John Noe nor what you’re referring to (I assume PC is PotterCast?) but I don’t have a reason to disbelieve him either; perhaps he just didn’t hear all of Heyman’s conversation, though? Surely if Heyman definitely didn’t say that, then WB would have him up there on the stand denying everything Steve claimed, wouldn’t they? There DOES exist the note from Cheryl Klein of Scholastic (attachment 1 of SVA’s declaration), stating that Scholastic’s editorial staff used the Lexicon extensively, although I realize that’s not WB.
You also said “Reference books are, afterall, meant to reference back to the original material. So, it fails at that as well. It’s not fair use. Period.”
Again, in my opinion, the Lexicon book DOES reference back to the original material, with enough direction that I’m able to find what I’m looking for, even if that constitutes a new definition of “reference” for Dean Johnson. I do not require an exact page citation as you mention, and in fact would find the page citations probably so numerous that they’d be tedious. I’m not a judge, nor even a lawyer, though, so I would not presume to say “It is such-and-such, period” or “It is not such-and-such, period” because I think that will be up to the judge to say, and he himself has stated that this case is not cut-and-dried by any means in either direction. It is sort of in uncharted waters.
I can only speak as a reader of both the Harry Potter novels and of the Lexicon. I enjoy the novels, and I use the lexicon to help me enjoy the novels more. I would like to have both on my shelves, and I would pay for both, and I would like to have the choice to make up my own mind as to whether to purchase without JKR’s doing it for me by deciding that the Lexicon book isn’t “good enough.” Any suggestion that either one substitutes equally for the other is ridiculous to me. In my mind, they are both original, different pieces of work with different focuses and different purposes that happen to be based on the same material and thus necessarily share some similarities in wording.
I cannot help but think that if JKR would’ve just let this go by, any of the concerns she apparently has() would’ve been taken care of by natural economic process. The Lexicon would’ve probably enjoyed a very, very limited success being purchased only by, um, intense readers of the novels (read: geeks) like myself. It wouldn’t even approach the success of the Mugglenet book, because the tension and speculation about Book 7 that drove that book’s success is over. Since JKR’s Scottish book is at least a couple years away, and since those same “intense readers” would most likely (who are we kidding here?) also buy JKR’s book given that it will have all the new info only she can add, what is the harm, really, in allowing us few geeks the chance to have a ready reference book on our shelves to use in the meantime? It will be obsolete and fade into nothing as soon as the Scottish book comes out, we all know that, just like Mugglenet’s “What Will Happen?” book is now obsolete, while the Scottish book would be a permanent companion volume to the series just like “The Silmarillion” is for its series. (WB’s argument about the grandparent purchasing an encyclopedia for their grandkids who then won’t buy a second one is really reaching, in my opinion.) The whole thing would’ve been under the radar. If the Lexicon book is really as terrible as she says it is, then nobody will buy it anyway.
(Except, you’re right Monsieur T, it sounds very much as if JKR is concerned about Steve/RDR turning the tables on her and copyrighting the “format” of an encyclopedia and thus preventing her from writing her Scottish book. I can’t imagine how that could ever come about, but to me it is beginning to sound like almost the only reason why this case came to this point in the first place…)
Hmmmm, guess this site doesn’t like asterisks. I meant for the last paragraph to refer back to the first sentence of the next-to-last paragraph. I had put an asterisk in those parentheses and again at the bottom… sorry.
“I have no problem for Steve to make a little money from all the work he’s put into it collecting and categorizing the details from JKR’s books.”
Posted by McGonagall’s Cat on April 24, 2008 @ 11:14 PM
Allow me to introduce you to the many members of the Lexicon Website staff who have ALL contributed years of hard work to make the site- from which the material for the book was taken- what it is:
Steve Vander Ark- Editor in Chief, Primary Writer
Penny Linsenmayer- project management.
Michelle Worley- Senior Writer and Editor
Josh Santilli- Assistant Editor.
Lisa Bunker- Senior Writer
Belinda Hobbs- Editor.
John Karns- Information management, Cataloging and Indexing.
Clint Hagen- Latin Expert.
I’d appreciate if everyone stopped implying that the material from which the Lexicon manuscript was made was done only by Steve, thanks. It’s a disservice to the rest of the staff.
That question was asked of Roger Rapoport on Day 1 of the trial and you can find it on the transcripts. I believe he said that RDR’s contract was only with Steve Vander Ark, and that he could not say how the compensation was planned to be disseminated beyond that point because that was between Vander Ark and the other staff contributers.
Yeah some stuff from leaky never appears on my RSS feed. But seriously the hard core fans are gonna boycott this anyway, dunno what that would make to the end up profit figures though
Bloomsbury/Scholastic – can I make a suggestion? Why not make
a Harry Potter Interactive Book – like the Dragonology books Have J.K.Rowlings help create it – and if the case looses, RELEASE IT on the same day the LexiGONE tries to capture the market.
Could be even a guide to Hogwarts – The book opens with a letter you pull out saying you have been accepted to Hogwarts, with a
list of items you need for school. A Ticket for the Hogwarts
express, textures of creatures from Hagrids Creature Class,
Things like that. Would make the youth go wild for it, and instead
of losing money – make competition SVA/RDR can’t compete with.
This way J.K.Rowlings has time to work on making a proper Scottish Book, the fans are happy, SVA/RDR do not make the sales they expected, they deal with protests, while a book like this would make it hard because you have published something so enticing and fun, no one would want the Lexi-GONE!
It’s a positive solution – because this case is going to be tied up in Court for a long period of time. Lawyers cost, Legal fees cost – it’s just an idea to make something positive when there is now so much negative energy out there. Creation has a way of blooming…
He threw Pigwidgeon out of the window. Pigwidgeon plummeted twelve feet before managing to pull himself back up again; the letter attached to his leg was much longer and heavier than usual -- Harry hadn't been able to resist giving Sirius a blow-by-blow a
your right Black cat idid go a bit over board mcgonagal’s cat apologize for the name calling. Its just that this subject gets me so worked up as it does many others I must learn to copntrol my emotions better