For those of you who are wondering how the new release date of the Half Blood Prince movie will affect the Azkatraz showing, the new edition of the Azkatraz Informant says that the special IMAX showing will still be on Thursday. Although the exact movie start time has yet to be confirmed, it will not begin before 8:00 PM. Also, the LeakyMug will begin about half an hour after the end of the showing, back at the Parc55 Hotel.

If you are a HP movie Percy Weasley fan, this news is going to excite you! This just in from the folks at HPEF:

HPEF is excited to announce that Chris Rankin (a.k.a. Percy Weasley of the Harry Potter films) will be joining us at Azktraz! Mr. Rankin will be at Azkatraz throughout the weekend and will be presenting us with a Q&A session at A Dessert with Chris Rankin.  This will take place on either Saturday or Sunday (exact date and time to be announced in April). Tickets can be purchased by anyone holding a full registration, a Merlin’s Circle registration or a single-day registration, and only 125 tickets are available! Enjoy a chocolate fountain and mounds of other sweets, plus coffee, tea and lemonade, while participating in a Q&A with Chris. After he speaks, he’ll visit all the tables as well.  Tickets are $65 through April 1, and go up to $75 through June 30. If tickets are available at the door, they will cost $100 each.

In addition, Mr. Rankin will be participating in many more events at Azkatraz, including autograph and photograph sessions on Saturday and Sunday. More details will be announced in the near future.

Be sure to register! Remember, the $145 rate for basic registration to Azkatraz is only until April 15th, so don’t delay! If you already have an Azkatraz registration, you can add the Dessert With Chris by modifying your registration. Email info @ hp2009.org (without the spaces) if you have any questions.

You can still register for Azkatraz and remember to write that hpprogs referred you!

HPEF announced some VERY exciting news today:

The Next Biggest Podcast Idol Survivor

Do you have what it takes to be the next Potter Podcast Idol? Have you ever listened to your favorite podcast and thought, “I can do that!” – Well here’s your chance! HPEF and MuggleCast are proud to present The Next Biggest Podcast Idol Survivor – a contest and endeavor to make the next great Harry Potter podcast. Individuals will audition on YouTube for our panel of judges by March 15, 2009, and the top 5 will be chosen to make the new podcast. Guided by our judges, the winners will go through all the steps necessary to make a successful podcast, like giving it a name, making the website, defining roles for each host, editing the podcast, finding theme music, and much more. The entire process will be documented on HPEF Presents (the official podcast of HPEF), MuggleCast, and YouTube. The winners will get the chance to podcast live from AZKATRAZ this July in San Francisco at the Podcast Palooza on Monday, July 20, and a Libsyn account to host your podcast, courtesy of MuggleCast. Here are all the details:

Part 1: Auditions:

If you think you have what it takes to be the next Potter podcasting star, then you’ve got to audition of course! Post your audition reel to YouTube with the title HPEF The Next Biggest Podcast Idol Contest – (insert your name here ) by March 15, 2009, to be eligible for the contest. You MUST be registered for AZKATRAZ to enter the contest (otherwise, you couldn’t be at the Palooza!). You must be at least 14 years of age to enter. Those under the age of 18 as of July 18, 2009, must email us a copy of the notarized chaperone form you must submit when registering. After posting your YouTube video, email us at pr@hp2009.org with a link to your video. You must also include the following information: Real Name (not your fandom name), age, email, and phone.

Part 2: Announcing the winners:

A panel of judges (consisting of hosts from the podcasts HPEF Presents and MuggleCast) will choose the top 5 audition tapes and announce the winners on a special edition of HPEF Presents.

Part 3: Making the Podcast

Once the winners are chosen, the work begins! At this point, the hosts will work with our judges to name the podcast, define their individual roles, make a website, come up with a theme song, design the format of the show, come up with new and exciting content, record & edit a first show, promote their show, and much more!

Part 4: The Big Tamale

Finally our new podcasters will have the chance to get their feet wet; there’s no time to waste, so they’ll jump right in! The culmination of this contest will, of course, be recording a live podcast at AZKATRAZ’s Podcast Palooza event this summer. Having worked with the judges for months in preparation for this event, the Podcasters will put on a live podcast by themselves in front of the entire AZKATRAZ conference. We will see if this podcast can become the next great Harry Potter podcast! For questions, please email us at pr@hp2009.org.

If it weren’t enough that Half Blood Prince is going to be screened at an Imax theater, or that there will be an awesome “Masters of Harry Potter” Business track, or that the formal and academic programming will be amazing, the folks at Azkatraz 2009 have made another VERY exciting announcement:

In conjunction with HP Alliance, HPEF is taking wizard rock into San Francisco Bay on Friday, July 17, 2009 with WROCK AROUND THE ROCK, a four-hour cruise featuring wrock, games, and a Magical/Muggle tour of Alcatraz from the water.

There will be food, an open bar (three hour open bar with alcohol available for a small additional fee), and music from Brian from the Draco Malfoys, The Remus Lupins, The Whomping Willows, The House of Black, Ministry of Magic and more!

Also, we’ll have one deck on the yacht that’s music-free, with space for games, conversation and, of course, food!

If you want to see all of the information about the cruise, go to the Azkatraz 2009 website for the details.

You can register for Azkatraz 2009 here. (Remember to write hpprogs in the referral section.)

We can’t wait to meet you at Azkatraz. And in the meantime, keep on wrocking (and prognosticating)!

After almost four months, I have finally gotten around to uploading the video from my round table discussion at Portus. The reason I chose to do this is three fold. Or would that be tri-fold? I don’t know. In any event….here are the reasons why I am finally posting this video:

1. This round table discussion was standing room only. Not only was I proud of the fact that it was such a well attended session at Portus; but the conversation was great and I wanted everyone in the HPProgs world to be able to watch and hear it.

2. Some of you might be on the fence about attending Azkatraz 2009 and I wanted you all to be able to see an example of *some* (and believe me everything else is MUCH better than anything I could do) of the programming at an HPEF event. Also I truly believe that the HPProgs listeners are some of the most intelligent people in the HP fandom and I wanted you to see that if an idiot like me could do a session, so can you.

3. We got this snazzy video camera, I have a Mac with decent video editing software and I was in the mood to use them both:)

So without further ado, here is the video footage from the discussion, “Voldemort Understands Nothing: Why This Led To His Ultimate Downfall.” I apologize for the four videos- youtube only allows you to upload ten minutes of footage at a time. (The videos are best seen in high quality.)

HPEF Presents is the new podcast produced by the folks who are bringing us Azkatraz 2009 in San Francisco, California. They have released their first episode today. Take a listen as Aziza and Will interview Gwendolyn Grace who is the Minister of Magic for the upcoming Azkatraz Conference. This episode is especially informative for those of you who are trying to decide whether to attend Azkatraz. It is chock full of information about the conference and you will definitely get a great taste of what is to come!

Click here to listen to the first episode of HPEF Presents. 

As always, if you are interested in attending Azkatraz 2009, you can still register. Please make sure to write “hpprogs” in the referral space and we will all be able to be happy HP conference goers together in July of 2009!!

As we have mentioned before, Azkatraz 2009 will be taking place in San Fransisco this coming July 17-21, 2009. Azkatraz promises to be on of the best HPEF events yet and we hope you can make it. The first issue of “The Informant”, Azkatraz’s official newsletter is up and it has information about registration, the Half Blood Prince Movie Screening, special events and more! Also, as we all know, HP Progs has some of the most intelligent listeners and readers out there, so we wanted to remind you that you can still submit proposals for presentations at Azkatraz. Both Greg and I will be submitting proposals and perhaps this year, Greg will actually get one accepted ( ).

You can go to the HPEF Website to register and remember that the sooner you register, the cheaper it will be. Just a little favor, when you do register make sure to write “HP Progs” in the referral area so that the folks at the HPEF know who sent ya there!

-Penny