Commercial In the publishing of books the following are the items of outlay which need to be taken into account: Copy right, paper, typesetting, author's corrections, electrotyping, press work, binding, advertising. Publishing means a great deal more than merely printing and binding a book. It means putting it where it is likely to sell. The machinery of distribution, which means the method of get ting books finally into the hands of readers through the various middlemen, is vastly im portant. The manufacture of a book now de mands the assistance of various branches of mechanical skill. Besides the paper-maker, the type-founder and the printer, to whom it gives a large proportion of employment, it engages, exclusively, the bookbinder. Its material form has, till the present era of cheap publications, always borne a commercial value extravagantly disproportionate to its matter.
Copyright.—A arrangement be tween the American author and publisher is a payment of 10 per cent royalty on the retail price of all sales; sometimes a cash sum is paid, and the publisher secures the copyright, which is granted for 28 years, subject to renewal by the author, his widow or children for other 14 years. A condition is that a copy of a title page must be registered with the librarian of Congress, and two copies of the book lodged there not later than the day of publication. The entry fees are 50 cents for an American author, $1 for a foreigner and 50 cents additional for a certificate of record. A copy of any new edition must also be sent to the librarian. (See COPY RIGHT). By the provisions of the International Copyright Act (1886), a foreign author's rights are protected in Great Britain, Belgium, France, Germany, Haiti, Italy, Spain, Switzerland and Tunis. Colonial authors can also secure copy right without publication in the United King dom, and a work copyright in the United King dom is copyright in Canada. American cheap reprints of British books are admitted to Can ada subject to a customs duty of 121/2 per cent, to be paid over to the British author, but the returns from this source have been very small.
Bookbinding.— Since 1X5, in the book making industry, many improvements have been made in wire-stitching machines. One of these machines will stitch anything from two sheets to a book two inches thick, and with several of them either round or flat wire may be used. There has also been introduced a noteworthy combination folding and wire-stitching machine, which, by a continuous and automatic operation, takes the sheets from the feeders, and folds, gathers, collates, covers and wire-stitches them. Paper-cutting machines have been improved by the introduction of automatic clamps, indicators and gauges. The invention of a steam round ing and backing machine has increased the ca pacity of from 500 to 1,000 books per day to a capacity of from 5,000 to 6,000 in the same time. The latest case-making machine feeds itself from a roll of .cloth which it automatically cuts into
pieces of proper size for use. The cloth is first covered with glue by contact with a cylinder revolving in a pot of glue. It is then cut by the machine and nicked in corner sections; boards are supplied from a holder and a back lining from a roll, both receptacles forming part of the machine. This process completed, the nearly finished product drops a little, the cloth is folded over the boards and back lining, and the binding, after passing through a case smoother, is delivered in a finished state. Among other inventions are a casting-in ma chine, for putting the body of a book into its cover, and a gathering machine. This latter in vention promises important developments in economy. See Booicarsniso.
Book Plates.—About the year 1804 the art of stereotyping was invented in England, and in a few years was introduced into this country. With the type-printed book under the old con ditions a publisher did not dare print a large number of copies of any book unless he believed it would have a quick sale. Books were bulky and took up too much space. Consequently, the types for a first edition were distributed when they left the.press; then had to be reset with renewed chances of error in the second edition. Resetting for two or more editions added largely to the cost of the book and lim ited its supply. The process of stereotyping first used, known as the plaster process, served book printers for about 50 years. The practice of the art was brought to New York by David Bruce in 1813, but the first hook stereotyped in Anierica was the 'Westminster Catechism,' made by J. Watts and Company of New York in June of the same year. For the printing of books, all methods of stereotyping have been superseded by electrotyping, which was experi mentally tried in New York as early as 1841, and was in general use before 1855.
Book Imports.— The summary of the chief imports of books and other printed matter for 1909 and 1914 shows the following:.
During the two decades from 1894 to 1914 the only striking change recorded in the book publishing trade was the enormous and phenom enal circulation of popular novels. During this period the advance in good taste and in artistic beauty of product was a marked char acteristic of the industry. Fashions in bind ings changed annually, but a widening range of materials and patterns, more daring use of designs and inks, and the invention and general use of automatic binding machinery supple mented improvements in printing, permitting lower prices for books and promoting phenome nal sales. It is a significant coincidence that the decade which witnessed extraordinary ad vance in all details of mechanical productions in this industry should be characterized also by the most noteworthy advance in the good taste and appreciation of the general public.