Deathly Hallows hits the net

[jgraz]

Yep, it's out there in the form of several hundred digital photos of each page of the American edition. No link here, but the article's been posted on Digg.com.

Be warned, even the summary of the article contains HUGE spoilers (assuming they're true) including the ulitmate fates of several key characters. Google at your own risk.

[Mist]

1. So nobody's had the nerve to visit Digg.com? I haven't either! Generally, these

spoiler stories are crap, but why take the chance?

[jgraz]

2. Yes, I went there

The copy is unmistakably authentic, as are the spoilers. They came up in a google search, so there was no way to avoid them :(

The link is now gone, but not before thousands of people grabbed the files. Be careful out there!

[Mist]

3. Given the measures of protection for this book, how did anyone get a copy

to post to the net anyway? I would think it would be easily traced as to who did it, considering there's a limited number of people in a position to be able to reveal the contents before the official release.

[jgraz]

4. Well, it's not exactly a military secret

The boxes of books are already sitting in bookstores. The hand that holds down the book looks like that of a young man (late teens, early twenties). I'm guessing it's either a minimum-wage bookstore employee or the kid of one of the thousands of people who already have access to the books.

[regnaD kciN]

5. From what I understand...

...Scholastic, while taking NSA-worthy security measures to safeguard bookstore copies, accidentally send out library copies a week early. (I guess someone there figured it would take libraries a week to get them prepared and cataloged for circulation.) It appears that at least one library worker somewhere "borrowed" a copy for the weekend and photographed each page for Internet distribution. Somehow, I'd be even more surprised if someone in that situation, with a scanner attached to their home computer, didn't simply scan every page and use OCR software to create a Word or Adobe version of the whole thing as well.

[jgraz]

6. Whoever did it is not exactly Einstein

They didn't even think to photograph the pages straight-on. They also had their hand in almost every pic, making it very hard to deny it was them if they ever get caught.

[regnaD kciN]

8. Unless it had a razor-sharp rendition of their fingerprints...

...or distinguishing marks/jewelry, how could you tell enough about a person's hand to identify them?

[LibertyLover]

7. Some books were accidently shipped to purchasers this week

according to an article I read today in the Washington Post. People had pre-ordered them from a discount distributor, who accidently shipped them early. I believe that Scholastic is considering legal action.

[Marie26]

9. Spoiled already

Sigh. It's like a siren's song, I couldn't resist, even though I'd get the book just 2 days later. But I'm still annoyed at the people who put it out on the internet, and also at the NY Times for publishing such a spoiler-y review before the book was even released. Way to ruin the fun.

[jgraz]

10. Me too. The RSS feed about the leak had all the spoilers in it :(

I'm trying to banish them all from my mind in preparation for this weekend's marathon reading session.