Current mood:	bitchy
Current music:	the a/c
Entry tags:	fandom, rant

Rant and a spoiler PSA [no actual spoilers, obviously]
Okay, can someone please explain to me what is so morally wrong about reading a leaked copy of HP:DH if you've already paid for a book and are going to line up at midnight to pick it up just like everyone else?

I mean, I understand the "robbing the author of her money" argument for the people who read the leaked copy and don't buy a book, but for fuck's sake, everyone involved in fandom is going to queue up at a release party or nip down to the nearest grocery store at midnight on Friday -- or sometime on Saturday. JKR's still going to get her bucks, and if people who are about to give her those bucks want to read the damn book off blurry photographs four days early, what the hell is wrong with that? If they're not posting uncut spoilery reactions to their journal and just reading it in private while they wait for the actual book to come out, I don't see what the big deal is. Spoiling others' fun is one thing, but if Fandomer X is merely reading the leaked book and not talking about it to anyone but his stuffed Chihuahua named Friskies (or other spoiler hors), wtf business is that of anyone's?

And a PSA, I suppose: the first 495 pages of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows leaked onto the internet yesterday. The remainder is expected to leak sometime tonight or tomorrow. There is word of organised efforts to spoil launch party lines, to broadcast spoilers over the Tannoy at shops (and airports? I doubt that one is true), and if you're a spoilerphobe, now would be a good time to limit your access to all mass media, not just the internet. In fact, I think fannish LJs are safer at this point than the streets in broad daylight, because most fen understand about spoilers.

As previously stated, I am reading spoilers (I'm spoiled absolutely rotten at this point), but this journal will remain spoiler-free^* until Saturday, and after that, all spoilers will be behind a cut for a month.

I get that many of you don't want to be spoiled and I respect that enough to put a lid on speculation until we're all on common ground. However, that doesn't give any of you "O NOZ HOW DARE U READ THE LEAKED BUK" people the right to tell other people what to do with their free time. If I want to read the damn leaked pages, that's for me to decide, not for you.

^*I will not post spoilers or so much as hint at them; I ask that others do not post spoilers in the comments of this LJ; I will delete any spoilers that might get posted in the comments as soon as I see them, and ban the commenter. I've turned off anon comments until Saturday, as well. That's all I can do.

ETA: Please don't ask me to link you to the leak, because I will not. This is a public post.

Son of ETA: I think I didn't make myself clear in the rant, so: DO NOT DISCUSS THE LEAK HERE, NOT EVEN IN THE MOST GENERAL TERMS. I will screen, even if it's "so how about that chapter 1, eh?" (this is a hypothetical example). Seriously. spoil_me_dh is a venue for spoiler discussion (and there are massive spoilers there; do not click if you're a spoilerphobe). THIS LJ IS NOT. D: