Copyright is under siege. From file sharing to vast library scanning projects, new technologies, actors, and attitudes toward intellectual property threaten the value of creative work. However, while digital media and the Internet have made making and sharing perfect copies of original works almost effortless, debates about protecting authors rights are nothing new. In this sweeping account of the evolution of copyright law since the mid-nineteenth century, Monika Dommann explores how radical media changes—from sheet music and phonographs to photocopiers and networked information systems—have challenged and transformed legal and cultural concept of authors rights. Dommann provides a critical transatlantic perspective on developments in copyright law and mechanical reproduction of words and music, charting how artists, media companies, and lawmakers in the United States and western Europe approached the complex tangle of technological innovation, intellectual property, and consumer interests. From the seemingly innocuous music box, invented around 1800, to BASF's magnetic tapes and Xerox machines, she demonstrates how copyright has been continuously destabilized by emerging technologies, requiring new legal norms to regulate commercial and private copying practices. Without minimizing digital media's radical disruption to notions of intellectual property, Dommann uncovers the deep historical roots of the conflict between copyright and media—a story that can inform present-day debates over the legal protection of authorship.
Author(s): Monika Dommann, Sarah Pybus
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Year: 2019
Language: English
Pages: 280
Tags: Media History Of Copyright
Authors and Apparatus......Page 1
Contents......Page 6
List of Illustrations......Page 8
Acknowledgments......Page 10
List of Abbreviations......Page 12
Introduction: A Media History of Legal Norms......Page 18
Part I: Writing and Recording......Page 32
1. Sheet Music......Page 34
2. Images of Books......Page 46
3. Voice Recorders......Page 57
4. Canned Music......Page 71
Part II: Collecting Agencies and Research Materials......Page 84
5. Collecting Collectives......Page 86
6. Celluloid Circulations......Page 102
7. Performing Artists......Page 122
Part III: Private Copies and Universal Standards......Page 148
8. Fees for Devices......Page 150
9. Flow of Information......Page 166
10. Authors of Tradition......Page 186
Conclusion: Legal Histories of Media Transformation......Page 197
Further Reading: Bibliographic Essay......Page 206
Notes......Page 210
Bibliography......Page 244
Index......Page 274