… to promote the progress of the sciences and useful arts …
It is particularly notable that the purpose of the monopoly was not for any profession to make money, neither writer nor printer nor distributor. Instead, the purpose is exemplary in its clarity: the only justification for the monopoly is if it maximizes the culture and knowledge available to society.
Thus, copyright (in the US, and therefore predominantly today) is a balance between the public’s access to culture and the same public’s interest of having new culture created. This is tremendously important. In particular, note here that the public is the only legitimate stakeholder in the wording and evolution of copyright law. The monopoly holders, while certainly being beneficiaries of the monopoly, are not legitimate stakeholders and should have no say in its wording, just like a regiment town should have no say in whether that regiment is actually needed for national security.
It is useful to point at the wording of the US Constitution when people falsely believe that the copyright monopoly exists so that artists can make money. It never did, not in any country.
Meanwhile in the United Kingdom
In the meantime in the United Kingdom, books were still quite expensive, mostly because of the copyright monopoly. Book collections were only seen in rich men’s homes, and some started benevolently to lend books to the common people.
The publishers went mad about this, and lobbied Parliament to outlaw the reading of a book without first paying for their own copy. They tried to outlaw the public library before the library had even been invented. “Reading without paying first? That’s stealing from the authors! Taking the bread right out of their children’s mouths!”
But Parliament took a different stance, seeing the positive impact of reading on society. The problem perceived by Parliament was not the self-described eternal plight of the copyright monopolists, but the problem that rich men in society dictated who would read and who wouldn’t. It seemed beneficial to society to level the playing field: to create public libraries, accessible to poor and rich alike.
The copyright monopolists went absolutely ballistic when they heard about this idea. “You can’t let anybody read any book for free! Not a single book will be sold ever again! Nobody will be able to live off their writing! No author will write a single book ever again if you pass this law!”
Parliament in the 1800s was much wiser than today, however, and saw the copyright monopolists’ tantrum for what it was. Parliament took a strong stance that public access to knowledge and culture had a larger benefit to society than the copyright monopoly, and so in 1849, the law instituting public libraries in the UK was passed. The first public library opened in 1850.
And as we know, not a single book has been written ever since. Either that, or the copyright monopolists’ rant about nothing being created without a strong monopoly was as false then as it is when repeated today.
(Note: in some European countries, authors and translators get some pennies for every book lent from a library. It should be strongly noted that this is not a compensation for an imaginary loss of income, as if every reduction in the monopoly required compensation, but a national cultural grant which happens to measure popularity and therefore suitability for that grant using statistics from libraries. Besides, the grant appeared in the early 1900s, long after libraries.)
Meanwhile in Germany
Germany had no copyright monopoly during this time. Several historians argue that this led to the rapid proliferation of knowledge that enabled Germany to take the industrial lead over the United Kingdom – knowledge could be spread cheaply and efficiently. So in a way, Germany’s leapfrogging of the United Kingdom proved the British Parliament was right: The national interest of access to culture and knowledge does supersede the monopoly interest of the publishers.
Late 1800s: Moral Rights On The Continent
In the late 1800s, the publishers’ ever-strengthening copyright monopoly had lopsided the creators’ chances of making any revenue from their works. Basically, all the money went to publishers and distributors, and creators were left starving, due to the copyright monopoly. (Just like today.)
A person in France named Victor Hugo would take the initiative to try to level the playing field by internationalizing a French tradition known as droit d’auteur, “writer’s right”, into the copyright monopoly. Also, he would try to make the copyright monopoly internationaclass="underline" until now, it had just been a national monopoly. A French writer could sell his monopoly to a French publisher, and the publisher would enjoy monopoly powers in France, but not in Germany or the United Kingdom. Hugo sought to change this.
Paradoxically, the copyright and patent monopolies were forgotten when free market laws were enacted across Europe in the mid-1800s. Patent law still talks about “prevention of disloyal competition” as justification for its existence, which is a remnant from when guilds dictated products, craftsmen, and prices. If a business practices loyal competition in their industry segment today, we raid them at dawn and haul their ass to court. The copyright monopoly is a similar remnant from the printing guild of London.
Victor Hugo would try to balance the immense powers of the publishers by giving creators some rights under the copyright monopoly as well, unfortunately impoverishing the public further. (It is important here to remember that there are three parties to the copyright conflict: creators, publishers, and the public. Ironically, the publishers, who are the party least necessary to sustain a culturally rich society, are the ones with the by far strongest position in the monopoly’s design.)
While Hugo didn’t live to see the fruition of his initiative, the Berne Convention was signed in 1886. It said that countries should respect the copyrights of other countries, and an agency — BIRPI — was set up as watchdog. This agency has mutated, grown and swelled and is today WIPO, which still oversees the Berne Convention, which has also swelled, mutated and been hijacked twice. (More on this in the next section.)
So, at this point, there are four aspects of the copyright monopoly, which have more differences between them than similarities:
1. The commercial monopoly to fixations of a work. This is the original monopoly granted to London’s printing guild in exchange for censorship.
2. The commercial monopoly to performances of a work. If somebody performs a work publicly on a for-profit stage, the monopoly holder has a right to demand money.
3. The droit moral to be acknowledged as creator. The right for an author or artist to be acknowledged as creator of his or her work, acting as protection against counterfeiting and against plagiarism.
4. The droit moral to veto an improper performance of the work. If an artist feels that a performance slights the work or the name of the artist, they have the right to deny that performance the light of day.