Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1920-09-16
About Copyrights
BY Fradarte , Has1rin

HupdDu pIctufe DubiHtsb1 AVtnfVuGy RuUH
| at high speed, q look into the Copyright
Division Of the United States Patent Office
reveals the fact that since the war there
has been great falling on In the pro-
duction OF motion pictures.
This may be due, Of course, to the fact
that photoplays have accumulated until
| production at high speed is no longer
| necessary, or IL may be that high costs of
production have made the prolific film
companies n little less 80. II may he the
beginning Of decline in the great popularity
OF the film, or il may be healthy tendency
to check waste production. Whatever
they may mean, here are the figures. In
the year 1g13-I914, the number Of photo
plays registered WAS 2,O39 and 10 1913
1919 it fell to only ,205. The decrease is
about rs per cent. Surely this is signih-
cant, but it would take q movie expert to
interpret IL.
The war seems TO have left several lines
OF so-called artistic production In slightly
less active state than they were before the
war. The number Of musical compositions
copyrighted, for example, is also on the
wane, though it is not anything like the
falling OF 10 screen scenarios. Ia 1919
l9l9 the number Of musical compositions
copyrighted Was 28,493, while in 1918
'p11 hfr bhdfpS were p,ZV3.
MORE MAGAZINES THAN EVER.
NO one seems 10 have realized that the
makers Of films and the writers and pub
fishers OF music have been forced 10 cur
tail their activities, but everyone has
heard that the magazines are having hard
time. High cost Of paper, printers strikes
and postage rates have all been against
them. Yet in the face Of this condition,
70 O83 different kinds Of periodicals were
published IN this country in 19ls-19I9 as
against only "a, 134 in the year before
the war.
The number Of books annually pub
iIshcd Is holding up, according 10 the
copywrght records, despite the fact that
the cost Of making a book in this country
has multiplied and that publishers have
been reported for several years as cutting
down their lists We would like TO believe
the publishers, but the copyright figures
show that in Ig18-lgl9 there were II. 7IO
books copyrighted in the United States AZ
against only 81 ,89l in the year before the
war. The figures for last year show that
about lob books were offered the public
every day in the year.
Where do all these books 90. you won
der. You see a good many books adver-
fused and reviewed, but not anything like
TINS number. The answer is that the vast
majority OF books are failures which make
almost no perceptible stir in the world.
but die peacefully and obscurelv almost
before the ink Is dry. The great majority
OF books never sell thousand copies A
book that sells two thousand Is considered
modest success and one that sells ten
thousand, even novel, a decided sric-
cess. The books that run into hundreds of
thousands are as relatively rare as the
men whose fortunes run into such figures
And fewer and fewer novels sell IN such
great numbers these davs. Novels have
smaller circulations than thew used to
have. The people read more non-ietion
books. And the lists from Libraries show
that the non-hction books they read are
oil much better quality than the novels.
THE BAD NOVEL CROP.
American publishing houses have long
made speciality of publishing certain
types OF novels which they believe the
public want-especially western stories
with bad-nen and cowgiris, detective
stories and sentimental love stories.
Ihe writing, no less than the publish
ing and selling of such books. has become
a perrunctory and highly organized
business like the production and dis
tr1bfitIon OF soap. The books have be-
come more and more artificial and hollow
every year. Yet such books are still
profitable, If only because of the great
organization which exists 10 sell them.
and any novel which does not accord
with their shop-worn standards has a
hard tune getting INTO circulation. As
a result OF this condition. the people
are beginning TO turn away from the
hctlon-mush factories and read non
flctlon books. At the same time. thew
DISPLAY a slightly greater tendency 70
md and read the novels of authors who
do more original work.
All OF tins vast food of books. which
goes through the copyright office every
year, tlnds resting. place In the Library
OF Congress If nowhere else. Two
copies OF every book copyrighted In
this country are sent there and kept
there. The result is that the Library
OF Congress has become the greatest
collection OF unchosen and unassorted
works IN the world. Ii contains noun
talns OF stuff which no one has ever
read and which no one ever viii read.
but at the same time, 1t has a peculiar
value. You can find things in the
Library OF Congress that YOU could
AAIu hoAnVhS else. suppose, Tor eN-
ample, that you want 10 learn some
thing about life in Montana in the late
seventies. Here you can find the queer
county histories, the old travel books
and such ike things which perhaps
contain the only detailed information in
on the subject.
A MILLION BOOKS.
When you learn that since 1897 the
number OF books copyrighted in this
country Is 1,077,4 Alb. YOU realize some
thing OF the proportions of this store Of
1t Is an impressive experience
TO wander through the stacks of this great
library. 1t IS veriable literary catacomb.
Here, emhalmed in silence and dust, Is
the literary history of a nation. And
every one of these little chunks of paper.
most of which have been so long forgotten.
many of which have never been noticed
at all, sometime represented to someone
Inspiration and hope and toll.
The musical compositions are a close
second to the books in numbers, nearly A
million of them having been copyrighted
in the same length of time. Photographs
come along close behind, the songs with
more than half million, while OF prints
and illustrations there are nearly four
hundred thousand.
Few people unde rstand the nature and
extent OF copyright protection in this
y.