Re: Samuel Johnson, Noah Webster and Sonny Bono

>>> david.dailey[_at_]sru.edu 09/27/02 12:10PM >>>
On the other side of the coin, it was apparently Noah Webster's energy more than anyone else's to get Congress to pass the U.S.'s original federal copyright law.
<<<<<

Webster played a large role in encouraging 12 of the 13 original states to pass copyright laws, and those laws undoubtedly led to widespread support for a federal copyright provision; but Webster himself had nothing directly to do with the first federal copyright act (1790). Webster, on the other hand, played a large role in the 1831 copyright term extension.

As for the meaning of "limited," I think the best example was in Lessig's reply brief. If a publisher offers a "limited" edition, but keeps printing additional copies when there is public demand for one, the edition is no longer "limited."

Tyler T. Ochoa
Professor and Co-Director
Center for Intellectual Property Law
Whittier Law School
3333 Harbor Blvd.
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
(714) 444-4141, ext. 243
(714) 444-1854 (fax)
tochoa[_at_]law.whittier.edu Received on Mon Sep 30 2002 - 18:52:56 GMT