Quote:
Originally Posted by schmidt349
Did you know that the concept of copyright didn't exist until the time of Queen Anne in England and literature seems to have got along just fine without it? In the age of manuscripts you just commissioned a copy of a book that either you possessed or someone else was willing to let you borrow. You didn't have to write to the author and ask permission.
Good God, imagine where we'd be now if the ancients had DRMed all their text.
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Copyright law became necessary when people started making a living from writing - this only became practical following the invention of the printing press. In Shakespeare's time, for example, copyright court cases were an extremely common occurence; far more so than today.