board77

halplm wrote:

I am fully anti-piracy, but I don't like the way they handle these releases, and while I am going at midnight, and will buy the book assuming they have a copy for me... I fail to see the difference in me reading it now, vs being able to check it out from the library on Saturday... other than an arbitrary date that is not that important to me.

I have to agree with this, as a matter of morality. Legally, there is an obvious difference, as we all know. As a matter of ethics, though...I'm trying to think through the harms that could be caused to the rightsholders by fans reading the books early:

Some people know what's happened by the official release, so the hype is lessened. The big questions will have been answered for some people - is Snape good or evil? Does Harry live or die? Who are the two main characters who die? (Incidentally, I don't yet know the answers to these questions, and I'm not going to look at what hal has posted until I read the answers for myself.) It seems to me that some intangible loss of "hype" only practically harms the publisher if it leads to fewer sales. I see two ways this could happen. First, fans read through the book online before (or theoretically after) the release. Either because they are disappointed with the ending, whatever it might be, or because they do not want to read the book more than once, they don't buy the book.

For most fans, this is inconceivable. Due to some combination of morality and loyalty to the author, most WANT to show support for the book as soon as it goes on sale. So the potentially lost sales, it seems to me, are sales to less-serious fans who only want to know how the book ends and only need to hear it once.

Even for those people, I gotta say...I doubt these particular leaked images are going to do it. The most wieldly form I'm aware of is a nearly 400 page PDF containing each scanned image back to back - hardly an ideal, or comfortable book-reading experience (before the PDFs appeared, apparently people were opening the work image by image, which sounds even more daunting). It would be hard to find more amateur looking images. In each scan, a berber carpet with red and green flecks resides in the background (I gotta say, one of my first reactions - thinking about the legal crucifixion at Scholastic's hands that the seminal infringer likely faces, if caught - was, "How stupid do you have to be to photograph the book on such a distinctive carpet?" Ten bucks says that if Scholastic gets the information based on DMCA subpoenas, they go over to the kid's home (seriously, I don't think this person could have hit their thirties) and find him/her lying on that selfsame Berber carpet smoking weed.) More eerie are the disembodied hand(s) residing at the bottom of each scan. (Again, I had a moment of "Really? You go to the trouble to take at least 400 photographs and put yourself at IMMENSE legal risk if caught...and you can't bother to use a higher-tech means of holding the book open when you photograph it than your HAND?") Lastly, some scans are far lower quality than others; the reader has to turn the monitor sideways (or, according to newspapers, a higher-tech fix is to sharpen each image individually in Photobucket), in order to read some of the words approaching the binding on certain pages. Hardly an ideal e-book. It's difficult to imagine that anyone other than a pretty hardcore fan would even want to make the effort to read the book in such a trying fashion.

And those fans? They'll buy the book this weekend. Maybe some of them will wait until Saturday morning instead of being there Friday at midnight, since they don't have to stay up all night reading. But their numbers will be reflected in the first day/week sales.

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How stupid do you have to be to photograph the book on such a distinctive carpet?

the carpet and hand is weird, and there's a shoe off to the side as well... I think they must have thought that the best place given the light... which makes many pages difficult to read...

There's a newer version with the photoshopped versions of every image, with filters to make the text white on black, which is MUCH easier to read.

overall, for someone who did 400 photo's in a few hours, it's pretty good.

There are probalby fewer than 5 pages I couldn't make out enough to read... but given how large the text is and where they happened... it's not exactly devistating to miss them.

but the filters make the hand blue... which is REALLY creepy

It's not easy to read, that's for sure, as you have to zoom in a couple of times on each image, but once you get used to it, it's not that much of a hassle. Granted, it's going to take me all week, rather than one day to finish it, so it's slower... but actually, I almost prefer it that way, as the last one was over FAR too quickly...

The best part of this book so far, is that it has got SO much crammed into it, that while I'm impatient to find everything out, I'm far too scared of missing something, to even read too quickly! There are parts of JKR's style and manipulation of characters to fit plot that I can't stand in the earlier books, and they're here as well... but there's not enough time to let them stick around too long, so things move on.

It's going to be mone of my favorites for sure.

Since I haven't read it yet, I'm free to post what I think will happen. Hagrid gets his brother Gawp to sit on Voldemort. Unable to reach his wand, move his hand, or even breathe, he's helpless while all the good guys circle around and kill him.

The two good guys that die are accidentally stepped on while Hagrid tries to explain the plan to his brother.

Harry Potter marries Draco Malfoy and they live happily ever after.

Although it doesn't explain the book out on Monday, about 1200 copies were mailed out from some online retailers to people who received them yesterday...

not much can be done about that, though.

Anyone have any data on legal action taken against stuff like this? Can the publisher seriously claim that people that ordered something online, getting it 4 days early... is going to reduce overall sales... they already paid for the book...

you know, all the hype about "is it a spoiler" "is it a leak" "is it real" is all adding to the hoopla... you know they are really chuckling about all of it in their offices counting their cash...

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Harry Potter marries Draco Malfoy and they live happily ever after.

Are gay marriages allowed in England under wizarding law?

When Snape destroys Voldemort instead of Harry destroying Voldemort, Snape can claim he was on Dumbledore's side all along. He will do this while maneuvering Death Eaters to kill the Minister of Magic. Then Snape will seize both that title and the title of Headmaster of Hogwards, as well as the title of leader of the Death Eaters.

well, it's just... awesome. Way cooler than I ever thought it would be...

It's difficult to explain it all, so I'm not going to try...

Heh if anything all this controversy is having the desired effect: generating a massive interest (positive or otherwise) in the book.

Set to break all publishing records?

Thanks for posting the spoilers, hal.

I'm sort of with vison. I read the first book and wasn't impressed. (Honestly, though, the movies haven't been half bad.) I do not care for Rowling's style of writing--a cliff-hanger at the end of every chapter. Almost as bad as Dan Brown's 2 page chapters flip-flopping between every character in the book. (I am a serious fiction snob. I mean, after Tolkien, is there really anyone else who can compare? )

I have considered picking up the next book in the series just to see if it gets any better.

But, anyway, I'm the type to read the end first, and I totally would have done so with this book just to see what happens. Now I don't have to bother. Thanks! I was curious to learn whether the rumors I had heard were true.


Lali

My review

SPOILERS, obviously...

Finished now, and had a chance to think for a bit.

We hit on everything important. Harry was a horcrux, Snape did love Lily. We didn’t know of the Elder wand, but it does fit in puzzle where it was needed (ie: even with the horcruxes taken care of, how could Harry defeat LV)? LV’s final fate is death by his own hand. It has a nice irony, although I think a lot of us were holding out for the ‘fate worse than death’.

JKR remains a master of the chekov rule – the plot devices kept falling into place like clockwork. All of the guns that were fired had been shown to us, and often fired before as well. That being said, there does seem to be an overuse of some – polyjuice comes to mind. I agree with Dave that the world is groaning under its own complexity by the end.

The actual plot has a fair bit of action, but the book really suffers from poor editing. Things take far too many pages to happen, and there are far too many diversions. It could have been PoA length (and quality) if it was tighter. This meandering, I think, is its biggest flaw.

It does suffer a little from the constant darkness, even if it is necessary. There can be no more wonder and delight in a world so familiar and in a struggle so serious. In addition, I think it suffers a bit from being away from the school – it’s almost a character in itself, and its familiar tricks and quirks provide entertainment in their own right. The book is often gripping, but it isn’t really fun to read. It calls for grandeur, and while JKR does it well, she is not as apt at it as she is at exploring odd and quirky characters and amusing events. Harry as the mythological hero doesn’t quite work as well as Harry the teenage wizard.

There is also less character development in this book. In many ways, that was all covered by Books 5 and 6, but we don’t see the character’s relationships with each other move too much. It was interesting to see Harry address Lupin by his first name towards the end, but I would have perhaps like some definite mirrors to the start of the series. We’re denied final Harry-Snape (although that may have been the end of HBP) and Harry-Draco encounters, for example, although it was interesting to see Snape confess everything at the end through his memory.

But the final chapters are very good. There is a real touch of high fantasy or even a religious undertone about Harry’s decision to accept his own death, his return, and his final duel with the dark lord as his equal. In the end, though, the coming-of-age story trumps the myth, and he has to survive and lead a normal life.

Overall, I’d place it behind PoA, GoF and HBP in quality. It doesn’t fail to deliver, it just does so a bit clumsily.

LalaithUrwen wrote:

I have considered picking up the next book in the series just to see if it gets any better.

Philosopher's (or Sorceror's) Stone is a good first attempt for an author, but the series definatley improves. Most fans will say that Book 3 is the point where it really gets good (ie: good enough to get thousands of people lined up outside bookstores in the middle of the night).

I thought that this book was perfect.

I could not find one thing wrong with it.

I bawled when Dobby and Fred died.

And I cried in the shop when Hedwig died.

Spoilers, yeah...






Like I wrote in the non-spoiler thread, I think Rowling was brave to write such a happy ending. Sure, people died, but Harry, Ron and Hermione (and Ginny and Neville!) all survived and became happy. I was absolutely sure that the ending would leave me feeling sad, and that at least one of Harry-Ron-Hermione would die - but no. And that was great. No one seems to write happy endings anymore. But Rowling did, and I salute her for that.

Curiously enough, I prefer being happy to feeling depressed.

Meh. A happy ending just means the author quit writing before the story was done.

I agree with Nienor on this one. Normally I'd hate this sort of ending, but it was done really well.
The thing about it was I knew the characters. They were my friends. I've known them for half my life. The fewer people dead, the better, for me.

I cried more for Dobby then I did for Fred...

Yeah; I think it could have done with a little more denouement. The people who died at the end don't really feel dead.

People die, I think it is an important lesson to learn in life.

Popped in the local Asda on the off chance they would have any copies left, but no chance... £5 a book is a big enough draw for everyone I suppose. I guess I'll just read it when I get the chance.

Garn I hate it when the plot wanders too much, in other books (Not JKR) I've skipped chapters of sub-plot just to follow the storyline that interested me.

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Had I known Harry would name his son "Albus Severus" and Ron would name his son "Hugo", I would have been rooting for the Dark Lord from the beginning.

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.fan. ... 032292dab5

Loved it. I loved every bit of it. I keep trying to rack my brain for things that bothered me about it, but I really can't think of very many. There were some things that bothered me while I was reading, but those things all turned out to have a part to play in the book. Ron's leaving, for instance. I was pretty devastated when he left, but it turned out okay in the end.

EdaintheRanger wrote:

People die, I think it is an important lesson to learn in life.

I agree, and I think that's what many of the deaths in the novel were for. It wouldn't have been very realistic to have an enormous battle between the Order/Dumbledore's Army and the Death Eaters without casualties (particularly very emotional casualties).


Sharkey! I always did think some of the names in HP were rather strange.

About Lupin and Tonks... Their deaths didn't make the impression on me that they ought to have. And I really liked Lupin! I think Rowling should have shown us what happened to them, giving them death scenes they deserved. Instead, we just saw them dead afterwards, which didn't... feel very personal.

Felt very sorry for their kid, though.