Author Sues Everyone Including Characters, Self
In a brash move, acclaimed author J.K. Rowling has filed suit against everyone, including her fans, characters, attorneys, even herself in an attempt to squander anyone from making a profit using her creations.
This all comes after Rowling, along with Warner Brothers, filed a suit against RDR Books and Steven Vander Ark for copyright infringement on 31 October, 2007. Vander Ark, a former librarian and more recently administrator for the Harry Potter Lexicon website, sought to publish a Harry Potter encyclopedia through RDR without consent from the author of the 7 children's books.
"I really don't want to cry because I'm British, you know," said Rowling after she was slapped with a lawsuit by herself.
Rowling also sued a family that recently surfaced in Liverpool. The Potters, James and Lillian and their newborn son Harold were served a subpoena to appear in court earlier this month when Rowling found their information online. Her attorneys and even the judge, U.S. District Judge Robert Patterson, Jr., were added to the list thereafter as what the author calls "a precaution". When it seemed she had run out of people to file suit against, Rowling then turned against her fans and herself, citing infringement on those who have read the books and the author.
"I did feel a degree of betrayal," said Rowling after filing suit against herself, "I believe that it is sloppy, lazy and that it takes my work wholesale, verbatim. This book constitutes wholesale theft of 17 years of my hard work."
The trial comes eight months after the final book in the series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was released.
(AUTHOR'S NOTE: After typing that last sentence, I was also served a subpoena to appear in court for using the name of the book without consent from the author.)
That is all.
(Additional Note: Special participating contibutor Nate Davis helped with the initial idea for this article.)