The development and importance of copyright law because because of the influence of technology

Majesty or the proceeding of both or either Houses of Parliament " Authority was also granted to arrest the printers and bring the offenders before the Committee of Examinations . The following year , on June 14 , the of the Lords and Commons enacted a harsh licensing requirement that provided the Stationer 's Company with complete control over printing throughout the British Empire

The prompted a reaction by John Milton in his pamphlet Aereopagitica , a document written in the form of a speech to Parliament in which Milton vehemently protested the licensing requirement . Within

br Milton 's document , named after the Areopagiticus of Isokrates (355 B .C , is a clause that supports the concept of an author 's copyright "For that part which preserves justly everyman 's copy . I touch not In spite of Milton 's protest , the was sustained . It was not until 66 years later in what is generally thought to be the first national statute concerned exclusively with copyright that "An Act for the Encouragement of Learning , by Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors of Purchasers of such Copies , during the Times therein Mentioned " more popularly referred to as the Act of Anne or the Statute of Anne , was passed by Parliament . The 1710 Act provided for the protection of the author 's rights in copies for an initial period of 14 years , and if the author survived the initial period , all rights would be returned to the author for another 14-year extension

American copyright was fashioned after the British statute . On September 5 , 1787 , at the convention to revise the Articles of Confederation David Brearley introduced the concept of promoting "the Progress of Science and useful Arts " by securing an author 's copyright . Brearley 's motion , which maintained that the rights of an author were statutory and...