For those of you who don't know, Pottermore is an online, interactive "reading experience" from J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. For the time being, access is limited to one million devoted fans who completed the "Magical Quill Challenge" to earn early access as Beta testers. The Beta period was just extended again, meaning the general public will have to wait a while longer before they can sign up. Once the site does begin open registration, new users will be admitted gradually; according to the official Pottermore blog, some may have to wait weeks or even months after registration before their accounts are activated.
So, as a public service, and to tide you over until the purple gates open for you at last, I shall attempt to describe Pottermore. It's no easy task - for something based on books, words are surprisingly ineffective at defining it. Well, here goes:
Pottermore is a new way to experience the world of Harry Potter, an experience that is completely unprecedented in books, films, games, or anything else. The centerpiece is a series of immersive artworks, several for each chapter of each of the seven Harry Potter books. Each of these pages captures a specific "moment" in Harry's story. Each moment has three layers of depth, allowing the user to zoom in and out, interact with the scenes, and collect various objects: spellbooks, chocolate frog cards, Galleons to spend on potion ingredients, etc. We as readers are now dropped into Harry's world and join his adventure - as he goes shopping in Diagon Alley, so do we; as he becomes a Hogwarts student, so do we; as he catches his first Snitch, so do we. Before we can confront the Dark Lord, we must solve Snape's logic puzzle - the same puzzle that Hermione had to solve in the first book.
Scattered along the way are bits and pieces that make Pottermore really exciting for devoted fans - nuggets of pure gold straight from J.K. Rowling herself, thousands of words of exclusive background material about various elements of Harry Potter's world, secrets being divulged for the first time. Rowling has personally written pages and pages of notes about everything from Professor Quirrell's childhood to the specific properties of each wand wood, which are revealed as you move through the story.
While exploring the first book, users go through two personality quizzes. The first determines what wand chooses you at Ollivander's shop; the second sorts you into one of the four Hogwarts Houses. Once you have been sorted, you can earn House Points by duelling other students (users) and making potions (each of which takes well over an hour to brew). Then the next level of the experience comes into play - social networking. Each House has its own Common Room (read: chatroom), with nonstop conversation among you and your Housemates, several posts every minute, 24/7. It's startling how much is posted just by Beta testers - I can hardly imagine how active the Common Rooms will be once the site is open to everyone.
The battle for the House Cup is very competitive, especially between the two frontrunners, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. The two have remained disturbingly close in House Points, taking turns in the lead. I am proud to be a Ravenclaw; my friends are mostly Slytherins. I check the Great Hall several times every day, and make sure to let them know whenever Ravenclaw is ahead; likewise, they take care to rub it in my face every time Slytherin takes the lead. Statistically speaking, it's incredible how close the two remain considering the magnitude of points each has. In the first book, Gryffindor wins the House Cup with 482 points; all four Pottermore Houses currently have more than 70,000 House Points each.
In the interest of objectivity, I will note that the website designers are still working out some kinks - the potions system is rather unwieldy, the dueling system has been down for maintenance since August, the comment system is buggy, and the servers keep getting overloaded…but, gradually, things are falling into place. The site is constantly being improved - after all, that's what we Beta testers are for.
A proud Ravenclaw - always have been, always will be. Glad J.K. Rowling agrees.
I am not associated with Pottermore or any of its affiliates, beyond having a Pottermore account.
