In what will go down in history as being HPProgs’ finest hour *or* our worst episode yet, we bring to you Episode #77. We decided to go a slightly different route for part of this episode and after our very short news discussion we re-enacted part of the J.K. Rowling vs. Steve Vander Ark/RDR Books trial. All we can say is that those of you who called Greg’s accent rubbish are going to wish you had saved your insults. On a side note, when I was editing the episode I realized that we botched the name of SVA’s lawyer. It is David Hammer, not Barry. Apologies to Mr. Hammer.

Speaking of accents, we played a voicemail from Potter’s Number One Fan in which he picked up Greg’s gauntlet and gave us a multi-character Harry Potter narration. Excellent job, in my opinion.

We finished off the episode with the introduction to Patterns In Potter for “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”. You’ll have to trust that we are telling the truth when we say that Book 5 has a good theme.

As promised the links to the court transcripts are here. Thanks to Cris for the tip:

• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3
  

It is a new month so please vote for us on Podcast Alley and as always rate and review us on iTunes and Odeo.

Finally, HPProgs has a Twitter account so please join in the fun and start following us so you can get all of our updates!

We look forward to hearing from you. You can leave comments here on the blog or send in your voicemails to 206-337-0357 in the US or 07092899490 in the UK. Please make sure to keep the message as close to one minute as possible and try to speak loudly and clearly.

You can listen to the podcast using the player below, or download it directly as an mp3.

Ginny, have you seen my Firebolt?

The trial over Steve Vander Ark and his Harry Potter Lexicon continued today in New York, in what appears to be the final day of testimony. According to the WSJ Law Blog (which may be suing HPProgs for copyright, as we’ve been linking to and excerpting from the quite liberally), the defense (i.e. SVA and RDR) seemed to have the upper hand coming out of today’s session. HPProgs legal analysts (read: hacks) think this might indicate that the judge really favors Rowling, but was testing their side more rigourously to see how they stood up to scrutiny. More likely, though, he’s leaning towards RDR/SVA.

The WSJ also posted an interview with an IP lawyer who gave his opinion on the case (long story short: too close to call). Did we mention that Anthony Falzone, one of the attorneys for the defense, used basically the same argument we did in yesterday’s podcast discussing the trial? He must be a listener (we’ll send you a bill).

In the meantime, more information has come to light. Commentor Bill posted a link to a site that contains most of the information that has been submitted for the case (I think lawyers call these things affidavits). Included in Bill’s comment was an excerpt of an email exchange between SVA and JKR’s representatives; what emerges is a very disturbing picture of a case of an obsessed fan taking things too far. This, of course, has no bearing on the legality of the Lexicon as a published work, but certainly adds a nice amount of drama and context to the entire affair.

Check back tomorrow for more updates on the trial. We here at HPProgs are hoping for a settlement; short of that, we’ve got two galleons on RDR/SVA.

This week, we take a break from the Patterns in Potter series to disucss the court case currently underway in New York between J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. on one side, and RDR Books and Steve Vander Ark on the other. There’s been excellent coverage of the trial (and interesting comments) over on the WSJ Law Blog, make sure to check that out.

In the mean time, if you have a thought or opinion about the case, leave a comment or a message and we’ll play it our next podcast. We look forward to hearing from you. You can leave comments here on the blog or send in your voicemails to 206-337-0357 in the US or 07092899490 in the UK. Please make sure to keep the message as close to one minute as possible and try to speak loudly and clearly.

No news this week, other than, you know, that court thingee. We will continue the Patterns in Potter series next week, beginning Book 5, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

You can listen to the podcast using the player below, or download it directly as an mp3.