While pirates are readying their photocopiers in India and China for the publication of the final Harry Potter book this weekend, a digital camera has already been used as a crude photocopier here in the West to publish the book illegally online.

Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows is available on file-sharing sites and has already been downloaded thousands of times.

This digital version of the book consists of a photo being taken of it two pages at a time. The book - a US edition published by Scholastic - is lying on a carpeted floor and the pirate’s hand can be seen holding the pages open, an empty coke can lies on its side next to it.

With bit-torrent technology, the more people that are downloading a file, the faster it can take place, making the two-file 75-megabyte Harry Potter download possible in a matter of a few minutes.

However, fans would probably prefer to buy the book – the images are sometimes fuzzy and likely to cause eye-strain after a while. For the curious, the download may sate their appetite a little before Saturday’s launch and there are already plot summaries online and lists of the characters who die, if you really can’t wait to find out how the saga ends.

July 17th, 2007 in Copyright, Internet, Media | Permalink