French kid who translated HP 7 faces charges
A 16-year-old French boy has been jailed for copyright infringement after translating the English version of the last Harry Potter book into French and transmitting it via the Internet to fellow fans, the Denver Post reports. The book's publishers, Doubleday, say that what the teenager did was illegal, and he is now facing criminal charges.
The reason why he felt it necessary to "break" the law is that in order to avoid anyone 'spoilering' -- that is, revealing key plot points or the ending -- the book, its publishers decided to not allow translators access to the book until its release date. The problem here is that the translators, who will take three months to fully complete their version of the story, get access to it at the same time as everyone else. Therefore, anyone can do what this kid has done, and if he can do it quicker than the official translators, why stop him? After all, he only released it to a fan site, and anyone who's eager enough to read his (presumably) fairly inept attempt at translating it will surely be the kind of person who will go out and buy the official version upon its release date?
It's kind of like the sort of people who went to the trouble of finding, downloading and reading an early leaked version of the english version -- they're the sort of people who would have queued up on the release date to get their hands on a copy.
The funny thing is that many French readers already know how "Harry Potter et les reliques de la mort" - the book's French title - ends. Le Parisien newspaper revealed it in an article it printed upside down.
The reason why he felt it necessary to "break" the law is that in order to avoid anyone 'spoilering' -- that is, revealing key plot points or the ending -- the book, its publishers decided to not allow translators access to the book until its release date. The problem here is that the translators, who will take three months to fully complete their version of the story, get access to it at the same time as everyone else. Therefore, anyone can do what this kid has done, and if he can do it quicker than the official translators, why stop him? After all, he only released it to a fan site, and anyone who's eager enough to read his (presumably) fairly inept attempt at translating it will surely be the kind of person who will go out and buy the official version upon its release date?
It's kind of like the sort of people who went to the trouble of finding, downloading and reading an early leaked version of the english version -- they're the sort of people who would have queued up on the release date to get their hands on a copy.
The funny thing is that many French readers already know how "Harry Potter et les reliques de la mort" - the book's French title - ends. Le Parisien newspaper revealed it in an article it printed upside down.
posted by Hugh at 4:26 PM
1 Comments:
New revelations regarding the jailing of the French boy who translated the seventh Harry Potter book:
The French publishers will not charge the 16-year-old fan, after consultation with J K Rowling's.
The public backlash against authorities pressured the release of the criminalized schoolboy.
The crisis that encapsulated people livid with anger revolved around Rowling's hyped marketing stunt that turned lethal.
-Hannah
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