> Introduced in the House as H.R. 2265 by Bob Goodlatte (R–VA) on July 25, 1997
> Committee consideration by United States House Committee on the Judiciary and United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary
> Passed the House on November 4, 1997
> Passed the Senate on November 13, 1997
> Signed into law by President Bill Clinton on December 16, 1997
Before that, it would involve something like literal film, which didn’t scale well, and was too expensive and difficult for a typical person to do at home. It still happened, but was VERY niche.
With VHS/VCRs, someone could spend a couple thousand dollars and make hundreds of bootleg copies of any blockbuster video out there from their garage, and it was easy to literally go to Blockbuster(tm) and get an copy to duplicate without being tracked. Easy money. Folks would sell them out of the back of (literally) vans, or through friends, or via flea markets, etc.
It’s still super prevalent in Asia, using DVD/Blu-ray’s.
In the US, it then eventually got applied to the internet, because it was even easier and more scalable using computers, and harder to track down the culprits.
It’s all about money in the end of course.