piracy in victorian britain

the article by Kriegal immidiatly starts by citing schwartz declaring the modern world as ' culture of copy', which he also repeats at the end of the article as well (233). the main [point of the article is the fight for a longer copyright for design patterns in victorian britain, so artists can protect themselves against pirates. conservative MP tennent and his allies became the defenders or original, artisan production and property during this time(246). tennent and his allies wanted a copyright law that extended beyond three months so other designers wont steal there work (kriegal 234). but the pirates of this time said that a longer copyright would create a monopoly for the artists but that didn't stop parliament from passing a law extending the copyright from 3 months to 12 months (264). during this time piracy had taken a different form instead of attacking ships there tactic is now looking through windows and using the roller to steal other printers designs. the country with greatest piracy problem was britain where even the united states hired agents to window shop for design (255). the problem that england had with piracy of their prints allowed for other nations to also steal their ideas which lead to today's wordly use of european clothing.