» Friday, 6 November A.D. 2009
copyright control
A thought-provoking passage from The Late Age of Print:
In contrast to the present day, where intellectual property and intellectual property laws are among its leading exports, the United States refused to sign onto or abide by any international copyright treaties until March 1891. Its position thus diverged sharply from that of its European counterparts, virtually all of whom had acceded to various copyright unions in the preceding decades...
Until 1891, therefore, publishers, printers, and booksellers in the United States were relatively free to produce, distribute, and sell their own--some would say pirated--editions of foreign works to American readers. ..
Between 1850 and 1891, the hands-off approach of the United States to international copyright produced not only an explosion of printed books but also a bevy of book publishing houses. Among these publishers were the Harper Brothers as well as other firms that today constitute the center of the book industry, plus lesser-known firms that have been all but forgotten. The persistent refusal of the United States to endorse international copyright agreements empowered these upstarts to challenge the practical oligopoly, and thus the financial well-being, of already established firms like Henry Holt and others. The former did so mainly by underselling the latter. In addition to refusing to pay royalties to foreign authors and publishers, they typically ignored the informal agreements--the so-called courtesy principle--that had kept the price of books produced by more established firms artificially high. Older publishing houses responded in kind by slashing their prices, leading to the collapse of the courtesy system by the end of the 1870s.
As far as the more established publishing firms were concerned, the ultracompetitive environment ushered in by this new crop of book publishers destabilized the book industry. As such, they found themselves forced to rethink their position on international copyright. If the success of this putatively reckless group of upstarts hinged on its ability to produce and sell large quantities of printed books, and if doing so depended on the refusal of the United States to recognize foreign copyrights, then it followed that tightening copyright laws would return stability to the book industry...
posted by Nate @ 7:37PM