Muggles Google for Potter

UK Internet users have been busy searching for Harry Potter in anticipation of tonight's release of the sixth Potter novel, according to Hitwise.

The web site of Bloomsbury, publisher of the Potter books, increased its market share almost four-fold yesterday in the UK Shopping - Books category. Tesco Books, which has cut the book's price by nearly half, saw a 69% increase in traffic this month. Amazon.co.uk, also offering a 47% discount, has increased its already impressive market share of the Shopping & Classifieds - Books category by 1.07% this month.

Harry Potter-related websites also dominate the Entertainment - Books & Writing category this week, with four of the top ten book sites dedicated to the little wizard. According to Hitwise Search Terms data, Harry Potter was the most searched-for book title, and the 210th most popular term in all searches, for the four weeks to last Saturday.

Pre-orders for the book, to be released at midnight, have reached one million and the book's expected to become the fastest selling book of all time. Bloomsbury has planned an initial printing of 10.8 million copies of the new Potter book, said to be the largest first printing of any book in the history of publishing.

The Hitwise website is at www.hitwise.co.uk

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.

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