Fans Boycott Harry Potter

One might think Harry Potter's biggest fans would be thrilled that a Potter movie is opening this fall, but instead, they're organizing a worldwide boycott of merchandise featuring the fictional boy wizard. The reason: Lawyers from Warner Bros., a subsidiary of AOL Time Warner, which purchased the rights to the Harry Potter trademarks and copyrights for the film, have been sending letters threatening legal action over copyright violations to kids who have created fan Web sites.

"It really got me mad," says Heather Lawver, 16, of Reston, Va., a site creator and boycott organizer. One girl, Lawver says, " was afraid these lawyers would come banging down her door and take away all her family's money.

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

So she and Alastair Alexander, 33, of London, have launched the Defense Against the Dark Arts project (www.potterwar.org.uk) to fight for fans around the world. "We're a voice for them, because most of the kids were too afraid to do anything," Lawver says.

This is the latest skirmish in the ongoing battle over copyright and trademark on the Web, and companies seem increasingly willing to sue for any perceived infringements.

Not only have for-profit cybersquatters been targeted, but so have fans creating online tributes to such pop culture icons as The Simpsons, Star Trek and The X-Files.