Within the issue of Starlog magazine with the War of the Worlds cover is an interview article with George Lucas. When asked about whether he gets confused about the all too many Star Wars materials out there, he said that now when he comes up with a new character name/element, he has to check with a Star Wars encyclopedia within this company to see if it already exists.

He stated something which he had said before, which is that he doesn't follow the SW Expanded Universe, he doesn't read the books. He also said that when they started doing all this (which is allowing other storytellers to tell their own SW tales), he had decreed that the Star Wars Universe would be split into two just like Star Trek (I don't know nuts about Star Trek, so don't ask me about that), one would be his own universe (the six episode movie saga), the other would be a whole other universe (the Expanded Universe). He continued to say that the EU tries as much as possible to tie in to his own universe, but sometimes they move into a whole other line of their own.

I believe this is the first time that Lucas has admitted that the EU is separate from his own movies, and that he helped to make this decision within his company. I remember Pablo Hidalgo (he has authored EU stuff afterall, so obviously he's biased towards the EU) hinting in one of his ROTS set diaries (this is what I remember, I could be wrong. Do correct me if I'm wrong) that Lucas considers the EU and his own movies to be the same by stating that Lucas used an EU term, "twilek" to address Amy Allen (who played Ayala Secura in AOTC and ROTS).

Being a very strict canon-only fan of Star Wars, I was actually disappointed that Lucas might consider the EU on the same line with his own movies, so now after having read the Starlog interview, I can breathe a sigh of relief and rest easier knowing that that is not true.

For more on Lucas and his feelings on the EU, click here:
http://blogs.starwars.com/Rayten/42