Harry Potter books stripped of J.K. Rowling's name are then resold by 'bookbinder artist' - 'Book artist' takes used books, removes Rowling's name — a project 'spurred by her transphobia,' [s]he claims

By Maureen Mackey | Fox News
Published January 11, 2023 4:43pm EST

A 23-year-old individual in Toronto, Canada, has been hard at work "removing" J.K. Rowling's name from used "Harry Potter" books and replacing not just the book covers with his own custom covers — but removing her name from the copyright pages and titles pages as well, according to SWNS reporting.

The individual has completed at least 30 newly "re-bound books" — offering them for sale in their newly bound form.

Artist Laur Flom, who runs a website in Canada, apparently started the project to "help out" any "Harry Potter" fans who find they have ethical issues with the author while reading her bestselling books.

Flom began the work a year ago, saying his motivation was the allegations of transphobia that were made against the British author, according to SWNS.

Rowling faced backlash a few years ago for comments that were considered by some to be controversial about the transgender community.


"Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling. "Growing up when I did," said a 23-year-old "book artist" based in Toronto, "it was a given that you would read ‘Harry Potter.’" The "artist" removes Rowling's name from her books — and then resells them in newly bound form. (Dia Dipasupil)

Laur Flom told SWNS, "The project is spurred by her transphobia … I was [a fan]. Growing up when I did, it was a given that you would read ‘Harry Potter.’"

Flom added, however, that "after J.K Rowling's views on people like me came out, it left a bad taste in my mouth."


A bookbinder named Laur Flom in Toronto is shown removing pages from a J.K. Rowling "Harry Potter" book — so that Rowling's name is stripped out completely from the book, both inside and out. He then re-binds and resells the books to interested buyers. (SWNS)

He added, "It raised questions about the ethics of consuming her work."

‘Creating a safe space’​

Flom said that "the purpose of this project is to create a safe space for fans to find comfort in the books and critically engage with J.K Rowling's work."

In order to "recreate" the books, Flom — who also reportedly works as a bartender — seeks out secondhand copies of the "Harry Potter" books.

"Just the fact that people have been interested makes me think that it's been successful."​

Flom then removes the covers and the copyright pages of the books — and replaces them with his own uniquely created versions, SWNS reported.


Laur Flom lives in Toronto, Canada, and said his "the project" was "spurred" by Rowling's "transphobia," as Flom termed it. (SWNS)

Each book apparently takes around 12 hours for Flom to re-bind — not including the time it takes for him to package the books and send them off to buyers.

Flom reportedly sells each newly bound book for about $170. For a set of seven, he charges roughly $1,200.

A portion of each sale is donated to charities that serve the transgender community, according to SWNS.


Laur Flom began a project involving J.K. Rowling's "Harry Potter" books in January 2022, SWNS reported. (SWNS)

The book work has not occurred without controversy.

Flom told SWNS, "[The reactions are] mostly good. The majority of my comments are positive — my last video reached a strange part of TikTok and reactions were mixed, but mostly good."

Flom added, "I would hope that the impact of my project is just to bring light to [Rowling's] transphobia and to make people aware of the things she has said … I get so many comments just asking what she had done."


Bookbinder Laur Flom has posted videos on TikTok about his "Harry Potter" bookbinding project. He describes himself as a "printmaker, book artist and Taylor Swift fan based in Toronto, Ontario." (SWNS)

He also said, "Just the fact that people have been interested makes me think that it's been successful."

Fox News Digital reached out to Flom for comment.

On his website, Flom describes himself as "a printmaker, book artist and Taylor Swift fan based in Toronto, Ontario."

"My practice is largely conceptual."​

He also says, "My practice is largely conceptual, exploring themes surrounding identity, memory and trans masculinity. I also occasionally rebind Harry Potter books."
He says on the site as well, "Send in your personal copies to be rebound, restored and de-Rowlinged."

Scholastic published Rowling's very first "Harry Potter" book in the U.S. in September 1998. That book was "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone." (In the U.K., that book was published as "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.")

The publisher, on its website, says that more than 500 million copies of the "Harry Potter" book series have been sold worldwide to date.

More than 180 million copies have been sold in the U.S. alone, it also says.

Adds Scholastic, "If all the ‘Harry Potter’ books ever sold were placed end to end, they would go around the equator over 16 times."

Maureen Mackey is managing editor of lifestyle for Fox News Digital.

Source (Archive)

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SWNS video:

 

[Snekposter]

A subforum just for that is overkill, but I can see it working with a megathread.

We'll see how much salt the new video game generates because we may see a whole lot of cows climbing out of the woodwork after it releases.

 

[Still Exceptional]

I actually think this is brilliant. Think about it, the books are used so they were already sold once. Rowling already made her money on them.
Then they're being resold but without Rowling's name on them. The only people who would give a shit enough to buy these modified books are insane assholes so assmad at Rowling they're unlikely to buy her books again. So it doesn't actually cost her any sales, so taking their money is a no brainier because then they can't use it for titty skittles, fucked up porn, and grooming kids.

Basically fleecing stupid sheep. I don't disapprove, per se. Yes, these books exist because of stupid and spiteful people, but that gives rise to the opportunity to exploit these stupid people for money.

 

[Candlelight Desolation]

Simply reading another book is a difficult task for people trapped in arrested development.

Funny thing is that HP got so popular because it killed the trend of kids books designed just to pump out five in a series a year and sell - think Magic Treehouse or Goosebumps - and instead introduced young people to long-form literature. However, these same people you talk about refuse to move on out of their comfort zone and read something else. I saw someone joking around on a different site one time that all YA is one of these:

1. Harry Potter
2. Paranormal romance
3. Adolescents rebelling against dystopian government
4. John Green

And this is all these people read. YA books in the 2010s, after Harry Potter ended, were all Hunger Games knockoffs that were trying to ride the coattails of a much more popular series, and none of them caught what made Hunger Games so effective... like they were all the same cookie cutter thing. I mean look at this:

Once those died down, you have gay teen romance and sticking with Harry Potter, which is what all of YA lit is now. Ironically, we've come full circle - Harry Potter was a cure to stop those pulpy kids books series (which still plague libraries and secondhand book stores to this day) only designed to sell, and now we have the same problem with the gay stuff and to some extent Harry Potter - there is a market out there for both of them, and they only still exist so publishing houses can keep pumping these things out to make a profit. Because of how many Millennials now want to reference Harry Potter when talking about real world adult political issues, the cure was worse than the disease, and we're back to square one as well.

 

[Fomo Hoire]

so taking their money is a no brainier because then they can't use it for titty skittles, fucked up porn, and grooming kids.

That assumes the person who receives the money is less likely to spend it on titty skittles, fucked up porn, and grooming kids than the people who send the money were.

The senders are undefined troon sympathizers who may or may not be troons. The receiver is a confirmed troon. A FtM rather than the usual MtF, but still a troon.

I wouldn't take that bet.

ETA: I wonder how much of the value is actually transferred after factoring in transfer fees and taxes lol imagine those being done all above board.

 

[Michael Bluth]

so is this what would be the troon version of the netflix show, You?

 

[WonderWino]

The amount of asshurt over JK is legendary, also I doubt if it's legal but it's Canada so there will never be any penalties.

It involves copyright law so the government doesn't really have a choice. That shit gets treated very seriously because if it gets ignored the party who owns the copyright can sue the shit out of the government for failing to enforce copyright law properly. Theres all kinds of international laws about it countries are party to

Unsure if this counts simply as 'Reselling' or something else genuinely illegal. It's scummy as fuck no matter what the truth of it is.

Its a copyright violation. Removing that info from anything and trying to distribute it like that is a huge legal no no

Something about this makes me think this is a deliberate setup to provoke JK rowling into suing her so she can be some kind of victimized troon martyr and scream 'see! look how evil that terf is! she hates trans people!' it would explain being stupid enough to violate copyright law so brazenly and getting the media to report on you for doing it

 

[Happy Fish]

On one hand this is retarded. On the other hand this is some obvious grifting and fuck copyright anyway.

 

[DamnWolves!]

Can't wait until this tranny bookbinds their neck to achieve vaunted Canadian Health Care.

 

[Kosher Dill]

This isn't a copyright violation at all, because you're not making a copy. People rebind books all the time, either to repair them or make them fancier.
Example: the most famous and prestigious rebinder of books sells rebinds of copyrighted works without any problems:

The Godfather, by Mario Puzo (1969) — George Bayntun

First UK Edition. 8vo. [215 x 132 x 40 mm]. 446pp. Newly bound by Bayntun-Riviere in full black morocco, the spine divided into six panels by raised bands tooled with a gilt pallet, lettered and dated in gilt, the turn-ins tooled with a gilt roll, marbled endleaves, blackened edges. London: Heinema

www.georgebayntun.com

You can do whatever you want to a book you own - rip out the title page, cross out the author's name and write in your own, bind it in a cover that says "The Sacred Koran", and then sell it if you want.

But what you can't do is print your own copies of the book. That's what'll get the copyright cops on your case.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

This isn't a copyright violation at all, because you're not making a copy. People rebind books all the time, either to repair them or make them fancier.
Example: the most famous and prestigious rebinder of books sells rebinds of copyrighted works without any problems:

The Godfather, by Mario Puzo (1969) — George Bayntun

First UK Edition. 8vo. [215 x 132 x 40 mm]. 446pp. Newly bound by Bayntun-Riviere in full black morocco, the spine divided into six panels by raised bands tooled with a gilt pallet, lettered and dated in gilt, the turn-ins tooled with a gilt roll, marbled endleaves, blackened edges. London: Heinema

www.georgebayntun.com

You can do whatever you want to a book you own - rip out the title page, cross out the author's name and write in your own, bind it in a cover that says "The Sacred Koran", and then sell it if you want.

But what you can't do is print your own copies of the book. That's what'll get the copyright cops on your case.

no way, clearly Xe is getting sent to copyright jail where constant copyright assrape will ensue

 

[Kosher Dill]

no way, clearly Xe is getting sent to copyright jail where constant copyright assrape will ensue

As long as it's only assrape. If any children were to result that would be DNA copyright violation.

 

[Fomo Hoire]

But what you can't do is print your own copies of the book. That's what'll get the copyright cops on your case.

They're making new products too, just of stationary instead of the text of the book. I think that might be a trademark issue at that point, but still, they are doing both. They're selling books with the copyright removed / altered, and they are creating new unlicensed Harry Potter merchandise that they sell for 30 canuck bucks per 9x11 sheet.



Sure sure, plausible deniability, it could just be a witch's hat. That's not necessarily a the sorting hat's face, it's just coincidental dark spots.

But can polyjuice potion and the half blood prince be coincidences?




Edit: I have heard of people buying properly licensed Pokémon fabric and using it to make unlicensed products to sell before, and I think that's fine as long as the seller doesn't represent the product as licensed (the material is, but it's not like the completed product is purchasable elsewhere). This is not that, this is an unlicensed raw material.

Edit2: Nevermind there is no plausible deniability, the product selector explicitly calls it "Sorting Hat".

 

[Where's Waldo?]

Man, I fucking hate when people assume that 'tranny' = MtF, and they try to start insulting the tranny with MtF terms.
Instead just reaffirming how retarded that people are about gender and shieeeet.

I've seen this shit happen over and over:

FtM does something and gets attention.
A bunch of speds: "OMG! YOU WILL NEVER BE A REAL WOMAN! REAL WOMEN AREN'T AGGRESSIVE LIKE THAT!
YOU WERE OBVIOUSLY BORN MALE! REAL WOMEN ARE SOFT AND DELICATE!
[optional: THEY LEARN TO TAKE UP LESS SPACE THAN MEN BECAUSE MUH PATRIARCHY!]"

Funnier when a bunch of the speds are themselves, female.

How many FtMs diddle themselves to people assuming they're male (in teh evil, bad, perverted way)?

 

[William Tyndale]

Mikejazzpenis nails it.

 

[GenericEdgelordSupreme]

View attachment 4249162
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Troon's removing Rowling's name and substituting it with a personal brand.
View attachment 4249074

Source

I wanted to see the modified copyright page to see if it still had the text about it being illegal to buy books without their covers, but thar wasn't deemed important enough to display in the gallery.

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There's lots of things going on, I'm not sure which are most important

• Sbe is selling what appears to be an upcycled stripped books. I don't know how long it's been since anyone read a paper book, but the copyright page usually says that if the cover has been removed then the book has been sold illegally. Technically that doesn't apply here because the books were allegedly purchased second hand, not stolen, but we're just taking her word here. It could have been self printed for all we know.
• The copyright page itself (which usually says buying the book without its cover is illegal) has been removed. No idea if that's got any special legal status, but I imagine it must, otherwise my dumb kid self that asked "why wouldn't the criminal just remove the copyright page if the cover is already gone?" is a genius.
• This is a derivitive work - troon admits it when she calls it art - so this goes beyond first sale doctrine and we can ask about fair use. Or in Canada, "Fair Dealing". IANAL but given that 99% of the content is not transformed, I don't think this qualifies as fair use.
  • If this were meant to be a display piece and primarily have the cover be displayed, I could see the argument. The usage of the original book would be symbolic and the text of the original would not be part of the artistic message. That doesn't apply here however - this is sold to make people feel less bad while reading the books, meaning the original text is meant to be accessible.
  • The alleged social commentary intended - JK Rowling is a terf - is ineffective when the new work doesn't mention JKR nor troons. This is meant as both a statement that "I don't believe this counts as satire/parody/social commentary for legal purposes" and a "this project is a failure, using the purported motive as a metric for success".
• This vaguely reminds me of the video streaming service that would rent out movies, but automatically fast forward through all the naughty bits to leave a safe for all ages movie behind. I can't remember what that was called so I can't check the rationale behind the decision but I'm pretty sure that was deemed illegal and forced to shut down. And that arguably was more transformative than this.
• Literally, she who shall not be named.

That dickless zippertits dyke will never be a threat to anyone but herself, and perhaps Scholastic's profits to some minuscule degree. It's almost delusional to think that a double mastectomy makes a woman intimidating. How about, I don't know... exercise? A female bodybuilder is 100x more intimidating than a chopped up tomboy.

 

[Fomo Hoire]

That dickless zippertits dyke will never be a threat to anyone but herself, and perhaps Scholastic's profits to some minuscule degree. It's almost delusional to think that a double mastectomy makes a woman intimidating. How about, I don't know... exercise? A female bodybuilder is 100x more intimidating than a chopped up tomboy.

Generally agree but with one caveat:

The bodybuilder is only intimidating in a fair fight.

If I were to encounter both characters in the wild (confrontation not guaranteed), I would more intimidated by the crazy factor of the troonette than the raw objective strength the bodybuilder.

 

[GenericEdgelordSupreme]

Generally agree but with one caveat:

The bodybuilder is only intimidating in a fair fight.

If I were to encounter both characters in the wild (confrontation not guaranteed), I would more intimidated by the crazy factor of the troonette than the raw objective strength the bodybuilder.

Solid point. Troons (of either sex) don't really fight actual men; they just act tough and make a lot of noise until conflict arises, flee it, then tattle to the nearest authority figure that someone actually called them out on their bullshit instead of swallowing it with a smile and a nod. After someone else handles all their problems for them, they to back to pretending to be tough.

^^not intimidating as much as annoying, but a tranny has a much larger chance of being an enormous pain in the ass than a female bodybuilder.

 

[The Lawgiver]

Why the fuck would anyone consider this generic blank ass shit an upgrade in comparison to the cool fucking art that these book's hardback versions are known for, only because it removes Rowling's name? Motherfucker just put tape over her name or some shit.

 

[SmugAutist]

It never ceases to amaze me to what extremes some people will go to not read another book.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

Generally agree but with one caveat:

The bodybuilder is only intimidating in a fair fight.

If I were to encounter both characters in the wild (confrontation not guaranteed), I would more intimidated by the crazy factor of the troonette than the raw objective strength the bodybuilder.

sorta like tweakers
sure they don't have real skill but they make up for it with pure batshit