123 "Authorship"—in the sense we know it today, indi­ Xerography—every man's brain­picker—heralds the vidual intellectual effort related to the book as an times of instant publishing. Anybody can now be­ economic commodity—was practically unknown come both author and publisher. Take any books before the advent of print technology. Medieval on any subject and custom­make your own book scholars were indifferent to the precise identity by simply xeroxing a chapter from this one, a of the "books" they studied. In turn, they rarely chapter from that one—instant steal! signed even what was clearly their own. They were a humble service organization. Procuring As new technologies come into play, people are texts was often a very tedious and time­consuming less and less convinced of the importance of self­ task. Many small texts were transmitted into vol­ expression. Teamwork succeeds private effort. umes of miscellaneous content, very much like "jottings" in a scrapbook, and, in this transmission, A ditto, ditto device. authorship was often lost. " " " " The invention of printing did away with anonymity, A ditto, ditto device. fostering ideas of literary fame and the habit of " " " " considering intellectual effort as private property. A ditto, ditto device. Mechanical multiples of the same text created a " " " " public—a reading public. The rising consumer­ oriented culture became concerned with labels of authenticity and protection against theft and piracy. The idea of copyright—"the exclusive right to re­ produce, publish, and sell the matter and form of a literary or artistic work"—was born.