Twins Marks - SMH article Re: Coke and Warner Bros vs. fan sites

Sat Feb 24 10:03:54 UTC 2001

No: HPFGUIDX 12900

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A few aspersions have been cast on the twins' grades of late.  Ron
says from the git-go (H. Express scene in PS/SS) that they get good
marks despite being the class clowns.  Three years later, they fail to
get enough O.W.L.s to make Molly happy, but otherwise we haven't seen
any sign that they aren't up to scratch academically.
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Here's my 2 cents on the twin marks issue... I think they are *just* above 
average usually. But the OWL's coinsided (sp?) with WWW and a lot of sweet 
making so there marks went down a bit (maybe *just* below average?) and Mrs. 
Weasley is used to EXCELLENT marks from Percy, Bill  and Charlie. So she was 
dissapointed that all her sons didn't get excellent marks...

I found the following article in the Weekend (24-25 Feb.) issue of SMH 
(Sydney Morning Herald). It's about Harry Potter but mainly the Coke issue 
and how Warner Bros was trying to close down HP fan pages.

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Potter magics a fortune from the marketing wizards

Date: 24/02/2001

By Mark Riley, Herald Correspondent In New York

It is the case of Harry Potter and the Marketing Magicians. The literary 
world's blockbusting boy wizard has conjured a
number of corporate deals over the past few days - one with Coca-Cola as big 
as its Sydney Olympic sponsorship.

On Wednesday Coca-Cola paid $US150 million ($287 million) for the global 
marketing rights to the film version of the first
Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.

Just days earlier, at the New York Toy Fair, toy-manufacturing giant Mattel 
unveiled a much-hyped line of high-tech Harry
Potter gizmos and gadgets.

But the marketing push has pushed some youngsters too far - and they are 
responding with a consumer backlash that has
forced AOL Time Warner, parent company of Warner Bros, which is shooting the 
Harry Potter film, to backpedal fast.

After AOL Time Warner launched a new interactive Web site, harrypotter.com, 
the company got a bit heavy-handed in its
move to stake out its cyberspace territory.

Warner Bros lawyers sent threatening letters to some youngsters, warning 
them to close their Harry Potter fan sites because
they were infringing Warner's intellectual property rights.

Now a group of fans is threatening a world-wide merchandising boycott.

"It really got me mad," one fan site creator, 16-year-old Heather Lawver, of 
Virginia, told USA Today on Thursday.

She said one girl "was afraid these lawyers would come banging down her door 
and take away all her family's money".

Heather has teamed with Harry Potter fan site creators in Britain to form 
the Defence Against the Dark Arts project to fight
Warner's moves to shut their Web sites.

"I was like, 'OK, this has got to stop, now!'," Heather said. "I've never 
liked seeing kids getting bullied."

Something eventually told Warner Bros that Harry, too, doesn't like seeing 
children being bullied.

The company has issued a contrite statement, admitting it may have been 
over-zealous with its letters and offering to talk to
Potter fans about their sites.

The merchandising maestros are having to tread carefully in exploiting the 
children's book hero, particularly since author J.K.
Rowling has been at great pains to protect Harry's "brand" against the black 
magic ways of commercial overkill.

The Coke deal represents one of the largest global marketing programs ever.

Yet, while the Australian-born chairman of Coke, Mr Douglas Daft, seems 
assured that things will go better with Harry, the
contract places heavy restrictions on the manner in which his company can 
use the character's name and image.

Harry dolls are out of the question. Ms Rowling has often stated her intense 
dislike of action figures, among items of
Hollywood schlock.

That was part of the reason she decided to go with Coke and not McDonald's, 
which was also vying for the contract.

Ms Rowling was looking for something with more of an educational bent, and 
found it with Coke when the company agreed to
fund a raft of child literacy programs as part of the deal.

For Coca-Cola, the bespectacled boy wizard seemed the perfect character to 
help it revive its flagging share price by securing
it a better foothold in the youth market.

Though Coke will be allowed to slap Harry's face on its cans, Ms Rowling is 
adamant there will be no scenes of him slurping
the sponsor's product in the film.

"This is going to be about the Harry Potter ethos, as opposed to a 
buy-one-get-one-free type of thing," a Coke spokesman,
Mr John Chandler, said.

There is also the ethos of the Potter corporate clout - 67 million copies in 
200 languages.
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Hope that clears something up... I thought you'd be interested. My dad 
rekons that because Coke is witht he movie that we'll see Pepsi being drunk 
by Dudley or the Slytherins... What does everyone think?

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~*Vicki Granger*~
FanFiction.Net Author
Hermione Granger in Harry_Potter_RPG2
3rd Cheryl's Angel in Harry_Potter_RPG2
~*~MeMbEr Of EvIl ClUb~*~
:>(*)<: Reserve Seeker :>(*)<:
Proud Ravenclaw

"Men. Can't live with 'em, can't shoot 'em."  --Laura Chant ("Harry Potter 
and the Show That Never Ends" by Lori)

"You do realize this magazine is a complete rag, don't you? Look at the 
stuff you can order in the back. 'Please rush me my Twenty-Four-Hour 
Cleavage Enhancement Charm. Only 12 galleons and it lasts all day. Please 
sign on the dotted line below to confirm that you're over eighteen, even if 
your IQ isn't.'" --Draco Malfoy ("Draco Sinister" by Cassandra Claire)

"So, when can I expect the psycho-killers? And do they take one lump or two? 
Milk?" --Maple
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