Lexicon Update: "Fan Feud" by Tim Wu in The New Yorker *Updated*

[rattlesnakeroot]

PoW! Tim Wu must be the bravest man in the United States to write this article! Check out the caricature also!

The Bench: Fan Feud by Tim Wu

I'm glad he didn't call it "Family Feud" although it does have quite a bit of "Mom likes you best" in it!

I posted this link in the Leaky Lounge, then ran for my life. 

Update: Melissa Anelli has written a

Comments

[rattlesnakeroot]

I just updated with another post Melissa wrote overnight.

The fact is, no group has criticized Steve more often or more noisily than Leaky Cauldron, and that's well-documented by Fandom Wank. This case has also gotten loads of attention from the media, some of whom have noticed the acid spewing out of parts of fandom. So there is light of day all around and not much mystery about why Steve said what he did. Nearly anyone in fandom might have put it exactly the same way, but of course it is much more personal for him.

When people kick someone who is down over and over again, and have no mercy on them even during an ordeal like this trial, they shouldn't wonder why "friendship" is not part of the deal anymore. Duh! Hello!

[clair_de_lalune]

The lady doth protest too much, methinks. - Hamlet, Act III, scene ii

Very interesting piece! I've only ever listened to one of Melissa's podcasts because it seemed very juvenile, which doesn't interest me, but now I'd like to hear the one referenced here. If Tim Wu's article is accurate, it will probably disappear before too long...

One thing Melissa says in her response: "Also for the record: Jo has never once, never ONCE, asked us/me to, or implied I/we should, do absolutely ANYthing just because she said so..." No, perhaps not yet. However, she has done so to the boys at Mugglenet (they complied with her wishes and remain in good standing in the fandom) and to Steve (who could not comply because he was already under contract with RDR and has been vilified for it, as the article states).

[rattlesnakeroot]

Good point about the podcast. There's no transcript available for the past two yet, unfortunately.

As I wrote in another post further down this page - I've read rumors that there was another book planned by Leaky Cauldron last year but it was pulled when JKR asked them not to release it before DH. I think it was a book of essays, and it is discussed Here. So is it really true that JKR never asked them to do anything?

[va32h]

I can only imagine what they are saying at Leaky about this. Loyalty to MA runs just a hair behind loyalty to Rowling

[rattlesnakeroot]

Tim Wu is actually a Columbia Law Professor who has written about this case before. I keep this on my link list on the side of the blog page, but here it is for those who haven't read it:
J.K. Rowling's Dark Mark: Why she should lose her copyright lawsuit against the Harry Potter Lexicon

And recently he made some very pro-Lexicon statements on CNN, about the fact that even though the fan writers are not "billionaires" like JKR, they still deserve some respect. I'll try to find that link, too.

[va32h]

Just to clarify - I don't question Wu's credentials or motivations at all. I'm just saying that SOP on Leaky is to malign anyone who writes less than glowingly about JKR.

Melissa

[anonymous]

Quite frankly, I don't believe a word Melissa says. She's a backstabbing little witch and will do anything to keep her good standing with JKR. Melissa is JKR's lickspittle lackey, her High Priestess (to go along with the religious imagery), "blind obsequiant to Jo's will". (Her words, not mine, and how arrogant can you be to call her by her first name unless you're in good with her?)

Let's not forget that Tim Wu was among the first to call this case in favor of RDR. He's already been burned, seared, tarred and feathered by parts of the fandom, so this is nothing in comparison to that.

Someone asked if Melissa had a job. The answer is, not any more. She's a writer now, not a journalist, although you have to wonder just how much she makes from TLC if she can afford to quit her full-time job and live in Manhattan without a source of income.

--Kristin

Re: Melissa

[rattlesnakeroot]

They've made jokes on Leaky and other forums for years that JKR was their "goddess." I'm not sure where this sudden moral outrage comes from that they don't see her that way. there are more pictures of JKR on the main page of Leaky than pictures of the books.

Also, from last November till now, not a day has gone by that someone hasn't been ranting that Steve should "just do whatever JKR wants him to do" and go away. "He should have stopped his book instead of going against Jo." I would daresay that those are the most common remarks of all time during this discussion about the Lexicon book, so how is it possible for anyone to say that is not what they mean?

Re: Melissa

[rattlesnakeroot]

Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Leaky plan a book of essays/predictions last year and JKR asked them not to go to print before DH? I could have sworn I read that somewhere. That would definitely have been Fair Use also, yet I'm sure I read that it was stopped just before Melissa announced her fandom book that is coming out this year instead.

Re: Melissa

[anonymous]

Yeah, it was along the same lines as the Mugglenet one on staff theories for book 7 apparently. Melissa pulled the plug because JKR's lawyers wrote asking for it to be stopped.

Melissa Anelli seems to be dropping Sue Upton in the crapper now over this. She can't boo-hoo too loudly though, she has screwed SVA over and over again on this case. Impartial Leaky? I think not. MA is protecting herself and her book and in reality she is a nasty piece of work. Who disclosed the email from SVA to Anelli in which the little worm said he blamed RDR for everything? It was Melissa.

These webmasters are all as bad as each other.

[cynodd]

I have *gasp!* only read the HP books once (or in a couple of cases twice) each, and have never been a part of famdom of anything, so this all looks a little bizarre to me. The Arachne metaphor really seems to hit the nail on the head--for a certain group of fans, JKR is really a god, and to question her is unacceptable hubris, and people who do so need to be turned into spiders or hit by lightingbolts or lawsuits. JKR, herself, may have been allowing herself, since she's treated this way, to start believing in it. If an author is a god who creates their world, it's not the kind of god where we can only play in it by permission of the ever-watchful diety, it's the kind of god of the deists, where you wind it up, and let it go. Once you've released your creation, well, it takes on a life of its own, and you no longer have omnipotent control over it.

[rattlesnakeroot]

What an appropriate icon for today, cynodd! *lol*

[bemoan1000]

I have *gasp!* only read the HP books once (or in a couple of cases twice) each, and have never been a part of famdom of anything, so this all looks a little bizarre to me.

Yes. One of the comments I read said the majority of HP fans have read the books and moved on. The majority don’t wait for "what will Jo say next." These readers have interpret for themselves and moved on. I do often wonder why I haven’t moved on. lol
I like the world and the characters. I like fan fiction and want to hear others own back stories and interpretation. I like shared universes. They can be fun.
Once you've released your creation, well, it takes on a life of its own, and you no longer have omnipotent control over it. Yes. Interpretation belongs to the reader alone. I understand before DH came out that we fans were looking for clues and coming up with theories about how the series would end, and having what JKR said was important to try and figure out what happen next. That was fun

[cynodd]

But it is scary that some think that only the author’s interpretation is valid. It’s like religion or something.

:) This made me laugh, because as a liberal church minister, I don't even believe that the Bible should be taken literally and only the "author"'s interpretation seen as valid! If I can allow for that in the Bible, surely that applies to Harry Potter!