The historian claims that the missing copyright is "the real reason" for industrial expansion. I think it's "only" a contributing factor. Germany was divided in

The historian claims that the missing copyright is "the real reason" for industrial expansion. I think it's "only" a contributing factor. Germany was divided in many smaller states and every state had their own universities. Many of these states were competing with each other about talent. So instead of centralising everything they had a distributed scholary culture. That's probably why there was a culture of "thinkers and readers". EDIT: Hence why a copyright law was not really enforcable. So the root cause was the division and competition, the missing law just a symptom of it IMHO. Plus: lot's of iron and coal easily accessible and many big commercially usable rivers for transportation.