Printing Without A License

I knew about the role of printing and English coffee houses in germinating the seeds of the British Enlightenment, but today I learned about the 1662 Licensing Act "An Act for preventing the frequent Abuses in printing seditious treasonable and unlicensed Books and Pamphlets and for regulating of Printing and Printing Presses."

The Act expired in 1695, which allowed unlicensed printing presses to flourish, reduced the price of printing, eliminated government censorship, and opened the UK to books printed abroad.

Feels like the regulatory context is too often left out of our histories of innovation.