Taking "copyright battle" literally
Sean McGrath notes that copyright law was invented by the Irish - and so was fighting about copyright, with 3,000 dead in the first battle over copyright. Columba, who fell foul of this first copyright ruling, was an ancestor of mine, back when the O'Neill's didn't have surnames [he was a great-great grandson of Niall of the Nine Hostages, known to generations of Irish schoolkids as "Niall of the Nine Sausages"].
Despite this copyright ruling, book copying continued in Ireland and Scotland, with monks making ornate copies of religious books. Obtaining pigments was difficult - blue had to be obtained via merchants from Afghanistan, and red came from the belly of pregnant Mediterranean insects. In addition, the monks were frequently attacked by Vikings [68 were killed in one Viking raid on book scribes in Iona].
Fast-forward to the 20th Century, when James Joyce's Ulysses was banned in Ireland and so was printed in Paris. Unfortunately the copies contained many typographical errors because the typesetters did not speak English. These typos have dogged (or fueled, depending on your point of view) Joycean studies ever since.
Now fast forward to this week - when I bought a printer/scanner/fax combo for $299 in Best Buy. I can print and copy documents freely, without fear of Viking raids, copyright bloodbaths, or unreliable typesetters. How things have moved on.
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