Harry Potter Series - PART II

And surprised I was.

Though today's proceeding lacked the excitement that was in the air yesterday, there was testimony by Mr. Vander Ark and experts from either side. Mr. Vander Ark testified that approximately 50% of his material came from Ms. Rowlings books directly and the remaining came from various other fan sites, contributions, essays, suggestions etc. Mr. Ark admitted to having discouraged other users of his website from cutting and pasting his pages onto theirs. (hmm....interesting - the words chosen carefully suggest that taking in whole is not acceptable to him, especially when the whole is a carbon copy. What about the 450 pages of nearly identical copying from Ms. Rowling's book?). Mr Ark thereafter proceeded to have his emotional moment in court today at the thought of not being a welcome part of the Harry Potter Club anymore.

It in interesting to note that prior to writing the Lexicon book, Mr. Ark admittedly had his concerns about anticipated copyright issues with the book in question. RDR advised him otherwise and even agreed to a controversial indemnification clause in the contract between them. Though the exact content was not mentioned in the contract, there was a verbal understanding that bared the result it has - an index containing material which dangerously flirts with copyright infringement.

Expert's from the plaintiff's side attempted to establish that with the loss of a "first to market" right, Ms. Rowling's encyclopedia will fail to receive the originally anticipated attention and market response. The distinctiveness would be diminished. This in turn would cause authors of future works to be careful of the latitude they give to fans regarding the use of their material. The result of which is expected to cause a chilling effect in that healthy relationship.

The expert from the defendant's side provided a counter opinion saying that Ms. Rowling herself was such a "figure" in the publishing industry as compared to Mr. Vander Ark, that her book would sell millions as compared to a risky/optimistic prediction of 10,000 for Mr Ark. He was confident that Lexicon would not compete in a meaningful way with Ms. Rowling's encyclopedia.

Now, here's the surprise or well, maybe not - Judge Patterson at this point was visibly unhappy with the way the case was going (long and seemingly endless presentment of evidence with no conclusion in sight) and so he decided to speak. He said that the case was now becoming more lawyer driven than client driven. He said that though Ms. Rowling's feelings are strong regarding her work and the defendants as regards fair use, maybe it was time for the parties to talk before they go down this road. HA!

Utter silence in the courtroom. So tomorrow should we expect a shift in gears or just more determined undermining of each others efforts? Can hardly wait.