Our New Mission |
| The Defense Against the Dark Arts has had a colorful history
in the realm of fan protection. Together with its partner site, PotterWar,
they successfully waged a "war" against Warner Brothers using the art of
the boycott. Warner Brothers had been threatening children who owned Harry
Potter fan sites, to which Heather Lawver and Alastair Alexander responded
with a rally of fan support to end the unwarrented threats.
Now that all but one of the original cases with the Harry Potter fan sites
have been settled, the Defense Against the Dark Arts has moved on to another
mission; protecting and educating fans.
The Defense Against the Dark Arts remains open, to keep an eye on the actions
of Warner Brothers, to make sure that the same incidents which sparked PotterWar
do not find fire again. By keeping an open eye, we hope to keep both
corporations and fans living peacefully side-by-side. And if a fan should
be threatened, we urge them to come to us. Our "armory" is ready and waiting
should something befall the fanbase of Harry Potter.
Another aspect of our new mission is education. Not many Harry Potter fans
are familiar with copyright and trademark law. Most of them don't understand
the need for disclaimers and such on simple "this is why we love Harry Potter"
fan pages. With proper education and prepardness, we hope to avoid any
misunderstandings with Warner Brothers in the future.
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| Here's a copy of what our original mission was, back when
the boycott was in full swing: |
Very few people are aware that over the past few months, the copyright owners
of the Harry Potter books have been sending threatening emails to the owners
and operators of several Harry Potter fan sites, threatening them with lawsuits
unless they hand over their domain names or remove content. When asked why
they are doing this, Time Warner, the said copyright owners, claim that they
are doing so because they believe the fans are only creating these websites
for illegal profit off a character which they do not own. While we acknowledge
that there are "cybersquatters" out there with evil intentions to illegally
make profit, we do not think it is alright for Warner Brothers to threaten
webmasters and webmistresses whose sole purpose in creating a fan site is
to bring the fans together into a learning, friendly environment. How could
they possibly think, for example, that a 13 year old girl, the webmaster
of www.besthogwarts.com, the Headmaster of an online "school" was out to
"confuse" and "mislead" fans in order to take their money? |
We believe that what Warner Brothers is doing is just wrong. It is unethical,
it is immoral, and it is downright nasty. A major corporation has been playing
the bully on the playground, scaring innocent children into thinking
that if they do not hand over a domain name, a website, or a few photos,
that they will lose all their pocket-money and their families will go into
debt. Is this the price for "corporate advancement"? Sacrificing children? |
By closing down one, two, or three dozen fan sites, Time Warner has sent
the fans a very disturbing message, to which we have a very definite response.
We Harry Potter fans are a close-knit community, when you pick on one of
us, you pick on all of us. |
That is why we have formed the Defense Against the Dark Arts. It is an alliance
of fans, dedicated to sticking up for each other, standing for what is just
and right, and banding together to stop these sacrifices. Legal threats are
not necessary, and by no means will we become uncivil in this fight, but
we will not stop until every Harry Potter fan site is safe from "big
executive" intimidation. |
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