“There is a necessary and healthy line between what the initial author owns and what follow-on, or ’secondary,’ authors get to do, and [author J.K.] Rowling is running over that line like the Hogwarts Express.” With mention of Judge Posner’s 2002 Beanie Baby decision (Tim Wu, “J.K. Rowling’s Dark Mark”, Slate, Jan. 10).
Related posts
In copyright; fans as infringers
I did some reading around and found this and this. It seems that Ms Rowling has a better case than Mr Wu lets on.
From what I understand, the secondary “author” didn’t actually create any part of the book. They simply set up a wiki-style website that others submitted articles to. I’m not sure what that will do to their position in this case, but if they prevail I would be willing to bet there will be a follow-up lawsuit by the contributors.