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  • From: tom poe <tompoe AT renonevada.net>
  • To: "CommStudios" <community_studios AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Cc: "DMCA" <dmca_discuss AT lists.microshaft.org>, "Rlug" <rlug AT rlug.org>
  • Subject: [Community_studios] Librarians Do Have a Way With Words
  • Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2002 19:06:25 -0800

Hi: This explanation of where our copyright law came from, begins with the
Statute of Anne. They certainly stated the case well, I think [ looks like
they have a comma in the wrong place, though <grin> ]:

http://www.arl.org/info/frn/copy/timeline.html

Copyright law as we know it began in England in 1710 when the British
Parliament enacted the Statute of Anne. The Statute of Anne contained, for
the first time in copyright law, legal protection for consumers of
copyrighted works by curtailing the term of a copyright thus, preventing a
monopoly on the part of the booksellers. It also created a "public domain"
for literature by requiring the creation of a new work in order to obtain a
copyright, by limiting the length of term of a copyright, and by limiting the
rights granted to the copyright owner (print, publish, and sell) so that once
purchased the copyright owner does not control the use of the work. The
statute also provided for an author's copyright - although the benefit to
authors was minimal because in order to be paid for a work an author had to
assign the work to a bookseller or publisher.



  • [Community_studios] Librarians Do Have a Way With Words, tom poe, 04/02/2002

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