Page "Anti-copyright" Paragraph 14

Liang argues that the concept of " author " is tied to the notion of copyright and emerged to define a new social relationship-the way society perceives the ownership of knowledge.

The concept of " author " thus naturalised a particular process of knowledge production where the emphasis on individual contribution and individual ownership takes precedence over the concept of " community knowledge ".

Relying on the concept of the author, copyright is based on the assumption that without an intellectual property rights regime, authors would have no incentive to further create, and that artists cannot produce new works without an economic incentive.

Liang challenges this logic, arguing that " many authors who have little hope of ever finding a market for their publications, and whose copyright is, as a result, virtually worthless, have in the past, and even in the present, continued to write.

" Liang points out that people produce works purely for personal satisfaction, or even for respect and recognition from peers.

Liang argues that the 19th Century saw the prolific authorship of literary works in the absence of meaningful copyright that benefited the author.

In fact, Liang argues, copyright protection usually benefited the publisher, and rarely the author.