“With great success comes rampant ripoffs…”

Law Professor Peter Yu has an article at Law.com about some of the recent – and older – court disputes surrounding infringment of the Harry Potter series; Yu gives legal analysis of the arguments on both sides in the Tanya Grotter situations, as well as the Chengdu, China-published fakes and the vintage-2000 Claire Field matter, which was resolved over two years ago when WB decided to stop badgering HP webmasters, and start being supportive of the online fandom instead.

Commentators always talk about how society needs authors, and how some authors would take up more remunerative jobs (perhaps as lawyers?) if they were not compensated for their creative efforts. The converse is also true. Authors need fans and customers.