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Jim Hill talks of potential Harry Potter project
- Thread starter napnet
- Start date
Hakunamatata
Le Meh
Just as good as any.
PhilharMagician
Well-Known Member
Just a note: Screamscape reports today of the whole JK Rawling letter of Intent story is false.
So believe or not to believe. That is the question.
So believe or not to believe. That is the question.
MickeyTigg
New Member
Actually.....Screamscape got the story from MuggleNet....
A report yesterday stated that JK Rowling signed a letter of intent to Disney concerning plans for a Harry Potter theme park. Today, a representative for Jo informed us that there is no truth to this.
JimboJones123
Well-Known Member
\
HAHAHAHAHA
Sounds like a real coin flipper. Guess it's up to the angry folks who hate everything to decide which they hate more.
jeffcot
New Member
Hi all--
I have some pretty strong feelings on this subject. Take a look at my blog--
http://2719hyperion.blogspot.com/
I have some pretty strong feelings on this subject. Take a look at my blog--
http://2719hyperion.blogspot.com/
Hakunamatata
Le Meh
Very well stated.
MickeyTigg
New Member
It's been my one complaint about Jim....he purports rumors to be news when he doesn't bother to verify what he gets information on. Yes, he's right sometimes....that's because rumors do come true once in a while.
I find Jim's site interesting because I think that the discussion of what he posts is interesting...not because he's right a certain % of the time.
SGT623
Member
The rebuttal to the error of stating the next book will be out on 7-7-7 as fact and getting called on it made me LOL!
Yeah dude, we all know that would be a great date. You still originally stated it as fact when it was a guess. This guess has a high probability to come true but it was still a guess and you can just own up to it instead of saying you were right because the publisher guesses that may happen too. What a stooge.
Yeah dude, we all know that would be a great date. You still originally stated it as fact when it was a guess. This guess has a high probability to come true but it was still a guess and you can just own up to it instead of saying you were right because the publisher guesses that may happen too. What a stooge.
JCorduroy
Active Member
The only thing I'll say to this is that there seems to be too much here to simply throw it away because JHM is wrong on occasion. And, if Lee thinks something is up, that's good enough for me. 
Additionally, JKR and her 'peeps', so to speak, have denied truths in the past as well to throw people off the trail. I think we'll hear something in the next few months that sets the record straight, but for now, I'll keep hope alive that this is a solid rumor and something is going on behind the scenes.
Additionally, JKR and her 'peeps', so to speak, have denied truths in the past as well to throw people off the trail. I think we'll hear something in the next few months that sets the record straight, but for now, I'll keep hope alive that this is a solid rumor and something is going on behind the scenes.
JCorduroy
Active Member
Sorry for the double post, but truth be told, at it's core, journalism is reporting based upon what you're told. While Jim should have made doubly sure that this info was accurate, you can't fault him for taking something a source says and reporting it. And, of course, Jim likes to put his special JHM spin on everything he does, it's his calling card.
Every other news agency does this every day, so having someone like Jim Hill report something as fact only to have to retract and say it was actually the publishers wish/sources information isn't different than Fox News or MSNBC reporting on a story and then doing a follow up to correct facts, or an editor in a paper putting a column in stating errors in a previous story. Happens numerous times every day.
AEfx
Well-Known Member
Wait a minute...you lost me when you used the word "journalism". Hilly isn't a journalist, he's a blogger and a rumor monger.
"Journalism" has nothing to do with it.
AEfx
Hakunamatata
Le Meh
Sadly, thats the direction most of the media has gone these days. Gone are the days that you get "news". It has been replaced with "Commentary on the news", which is often skewed to the persons belief who is commentating or their employer.
AEfx
Well-Known Member
Exactly. If you dig up some of my past posts regarding 'ol Hilly boy (I refuse to give him publicity by saying his name properly, LOL) you will read sentiments remarkably similar.
Like most Disney fans, I discovered his site and thought "Wow! What great stories!" because I read his Splash Mountain piece, for instance. He's not a bad storyteller.
The problem is, as you point out, once you look even the tiniest bit deeper into just about anything he says, you realize his credibility is just about as high as a ground slug.
You just can't believe anything he says. He will do ANYTHING to get his name known in the larger media-sphere. Again, look at his "LOST" exclusive last year - which I believe has actually disapeared from his site, like many stories that didn't pan out - he just grasps and grasps for some link to media credibility.
The saddes part, as you aptly pointed out in your blog, is that a) in a way, he does accomplish this because we are talking about it, and his gossip did make it very far this time, and b) some people actually buy into everything he says.
The thing is, many people have come around and most informed Disney fans know better. He creates a stir a couple of times a year, looks pathetic, and looses a few more fanbois. I've said it a million times - he's the "National Enquirer" of Disney-fandom; just like there are sheeple on this earth that read that and believe the smut tabloids, there will always be people that believe Hilly's tabloid crap because it makes for more interesting reading occasionally than the truth.
I just know we'll all always get the last laugh, because no matter what he does with his life, Hilly is still the guy that got thrown out of Disneyland...can you imagine? I'd be so embarassed, and heartbroken, if I got kicked out of my favorite place. He tried to make publicity from it, even took money for CDs...did that ever happen? LOL. Probably not, though I stopped going to his site even as a curiousity awhile back and I wouldn't be surprised at all. He's never finished anything he's ever begun.
Hey, where is that office boy he used to send over here to make fun of us for pointing out the truth about ol' Hilly? Haven't seen him post for awhile. It was always entertaining to see him try to defend the lies and inaccuracies.
AEfx
JCorduroy
Active Member
Well, all smugness aside, the definition of journalism is to report the news to a media format - that's all - be it blog, news papaer, television news, radio broadcast, etc. To be honest, in this day and age, blogs are one of the main sources of news available to the public. Many news sites are just glorified blogs (take aint-it-cool news for movies, or IGN for gaming, or the countless Disney sites fanatics such as you and I visit religiously.)
Some of the best journalists are speculative and rumor mongors. Most are fanatical and spin doctors. Jim, despite his faults, is a good writer. I don't like a lot of the things he writes, and I dismiss probably 75% of them as false, but I don't discount the fact that he's a journalist and he reports what he hears, sees, and thinks.
If you want to get down to basics, he's an investigative journalist. He takes clues, hints, allegations, and he puts them into articles - same as any other.
jeffcot
New Member
Well, all smugness aside, the definition of journalism is to report the news to a media format - that's all - be it blog, news papaer, television news, radio broadcast, etc. To be honest, in this day and age, blogs are one of the main sources of news available to the public. Many news sites are just glorified blogs (take aint-it-cool news for movies, or IGN for gaming, or the countless Disney sites fanatics such as you and I visit religiously.)
Some of the best journalists are speculative and rumor mongors. Most are fanatical and spin doctors. Jim, despite his faults, is a good writer. I don't like a lot of the things he writes, and I dismiss probably 75% of them as false, but I don't discount the fact that he's a journalist and he reports what he hears, sees, and thinks.
If you want to get down to basics, he's an investigative journalist. He takes clues, hints, allegations, and he puts them into articles - same as any other.
Your defintion of journalism is not exactly the one I learned in college, and I have a BA in Journalism and Communications. Taking clues, hints and allegations, and reporting them as news? Those are the very things my professors taught me not to do!
First, as I stated in the piece on my blog--there is a difference between news and gossip. There is also a difference between writing a blog or column and reporting news. A good reporter verifies his sources and facts. In the Harry Potter piece, Jim did not even originally attribute a source. He made a statement concerning the Letter of Intent, but never backed it up with any facts. The bit about Peter Jackson was pure speculation on his part. Speculation is not news reporting. I have no problem with Jim speculating and gossiping; just don't call it news, and certainly don't call it investigative reporting. Rumor mongers aren't good journalists. They're not even bad journalists. They're not journalists at all.
AEfx
Well-Known Member
What he said.
Seriously, while my first reply was a bit smug (okay, very smug), but my sentiment was sincere.
Hilly is not a journalist. He is a decent storyteller. The problem is, he takes one random thread of a rumor, and then another, and strings them together in a fanciful way while never citing a source at ALL.
Now, some of his fanbois argue that "well, it's confidential!", well...it's ALWAYS confidential with Hilly. And he always gets some facts wrong.
Time and time again I saw inaccuracies what appeared on his site. Little things sometimes, but they add up to someone who simply can't be called a journalist, but at most an Opinion piece.
I think the reason you will find Hilly gets so much ire from people is because he presents everything as fact. While he's a decent storyteller, it's ruined because once you see the cracks around the edges, it's no longer fun because you have to pick and choose what to believe. There are just dozens and dozens of examples of this...and why I don't even read his site anymore. He stopped telling interesting stories long ago, now it's just depserate grasping for some meaning to his gossiping and blogging.
Now, to be fair, I also have argued before that Larry King isn't a journalist. Not that I hold King and Hilly in anywhere near the same esteem, it's the same principle; Larry King is a world-class interviewer, but not a "journalist", as that's a very specific job. Hilly is a blogger who is not regularly published and worse (I really think this is the worst thing about him) he never, ever, ever finishes what he starts. Ever. He has no follow-through.
I'd probably still read his site if he would ever finish that Star Tours piece ("Okay guys, really for real..I've written three parts, but now feel I should start over...I promise, give me a couple of weeks, this won't be like my Muppets piece...or my Light Magic article...or..." on and on.) He's just pathetic, and since he puts himself out there over and over, and continues to try to grasp for that spotlight that elludes him, I think he deserves any criticism he gets.
I wish it would help, but he's been this way for as long as I've been famliar with him. It's so darn cold out there in the NH woods I guess it's just too hard for him to keep up and finish anything he starts; it's more important for him to get the notoriously vocal Potter fans talking about him than worrying about facts.
I think he should go after the Claymates next - he could get their collective panties in a wad by suggesting they want Aiken (so hard to write that without the "G" at the begining, LOL) to play Prince Eric in the Little Mermaid on Broadway.
You heard it here first, folks. Hilly has been known to troll WDWMagic for article ideas...I call this one.
AEfx
wannab@dis
Well-Known Member
All issues of content aside...
He's one of the worse "writers" I've ever seen with a decently popular blog / tabloid site. His sentence structure is horrid and his grammar lacking.
Pumbas Nakasak
Heading for the great escape.
glad too see your all denying him the oxygen of publicity :animwink:
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