Mark Rose: Authors and Owners: The Invention of Copyright (1993)
Filed under book | Tags: · copyright, intellectual property, united kingdom
The notion of the author as the creator and therefore the first owner of a work is deeply rooted both in our economic system and in our concept of the individual. But this concept of authorship is modern. Mark Rose traces the formation of copyright in eighteenth-century Britain—and in the process highlights still current issues of intellectual property. Authors and Owners is at once a fascinating look at an important episode in legal history and a significant contribution to literary and cultural history.
Publisher Harvard University Press, 1993
ISBN 0674053095, 9780674053090
176 pages
Elizabeth Armstrong: Before Copyright. The French Book-Privilege System 1498-1526 (1990)
Filed under book | Tags: · 1500s, book, copyright, france, print, publishing
“When printing first began, a new book automatically fell into the public domain upon publication. Only a special law or privilegium enacted by a competent authority could protect it from being reprinted without the consent of the author or publisher. Such privileges for books are attested before 1480, but in Germany and Italy their efficacy was limited to a relatively small area by the political fragmentation of the country. During the 1480s and 1490s France became one of Europe’s main centres of book production and, as competition intensified, privileges were sought there from 1498. Although privileges were to last as long as the Ancien Régime, the period to 1526 is the least-known stage of their development and the most important. Most privilege-holders printed the full text of their grant, and many others a summary.”
Publisher Cambridge University Press, 1990
ISBN 0521374081
344 pages
Peter Drahos, John Braithwaite: Information Feudalism: Who Owns the Knowledge Economy? (2002)
Filed under book | Tags: · activism, business, copyright, economics, intellectual property, knowledge economy, law, piracy, politics, TRIPS, wto
New intellectual property regimes are entrenching new inequalities. Access to information is fundamental to the exercise of human rights and marketplace competition, but patents are being used to lock up vital educational, software, genetic and other information, creating a global property order dominated by a multinational elite. How did intellectual property rules become part of the World Trade Organization’s free trade agreements? How have these rules changed the knowledge game for international business? What are the consequences for the ownership of biotechnology and digital technology, and for all those who have to pay for what was once shared information? Based on extensive interviews with key players, this book tells the story of these profound transformations in information ownership. The authors argue that in the globalized information society, the rich have found new ways to rob the poor, and shows how intellectual property rights can be more democratically defined.
Publisher Earthscan, 2002
ISBN 1853839175, 9781853839177
253 pages
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