Motion Picture Patents Company

The Motion Picture Patents Company ( MPPC ), and Edison Trust, was established in 1908 Trust, which consisted of all important at that time in the U.S. companies in the film industry. In the U.S., the Trust was known as the first oligopoly. The Trust lost in 1912 due to court decisions in importance and existed until 1915, when he was declared under the provisions of the Sherman Antitrust Act illegal.

Purpose of the trust was to unite all patents of the companies involved in a common society and to pursue violations rigorously. This all competition access to the American film market should be made ​​impossible. Ultimately, however, the Trust supported the relocation of the U.S. film industry of New York (especially the suburb of Fort Lee) on the East Coast to Los Angeles ( with Hollywood as the center ) on the west coast.

History

End of 1908, on the initiative of movie companies Edison and Biograph the Motion Picture Patents Company, shortly MPPC. This trust united the patents of all the major film producers ( Edison, Biograph, Vitagraph, Essanay, Selig, Lubin, Kalem Company, American Star, American Pathé ), the largest film distribution ( George Kleine ) and the biggest producers of film, Eastman Kodak. This should send a oligopole control the film industry can be realized.

The MPPC contributed by its aggressive policies instrumental in shifting the center of the film industry from the area around New York City to Hollywood, since this is where independent filmmakers felt safer prior to the MPPC.

In the early days of the American film, the most important patents were in film production with Thomas Edison, who tried to enforce them rigorously using the MPPC. Complaints and warnings against independent film studios were on the agenda. The Trust also sent out thugs who are not licensed smashed cameras, while the film crew did not spare. The independent filmmakers responded by they moved to Hollywood: The place was far from the headquarters of the MPPC in New Jersey, also Mexico was close. When it was announced that a representative of the MPPC was on the way to Southern California, the movie studios fled to neighboring countries in the short term.

The MPPC failed ultimately to the fact that the independent film studios were commercially successful enough to break the Trust, on the other hand was the legal basis of their enterprises gradually weaker. Main reasons for the economic success of the independents were the introduction of full-length feature films and the structure of a star system. The Trust, however, stopped at his concept short films without naming the actor to produce further proof. The Supreme Court of the United States lifted in 1912 the patent for film production and 1915, all other patents of the company. The conviction in 1917 because of the Sherman Antitrust Act meant the definitive end for the Trust, which had at that time but already lost all influence.

Business practices

To prevent competition between the parties to the Trust MPPC adopted a standard price per meter for each movie newly released and determined how many movies could bring the film companies per week on the market. These were at the former length of a film of ten to twenty minutes between one and three films.

The MPPC delivered their films only to those exchanges film ( films were then sold and the system of film distribution prevailed until several years later, when the films were longer and therefore more expensive) and movie theaters that were licensed by the MPPC. Licensed cinemas had a week to pay royalties for the film projectors used. Against unlicensed cinemas been subject to legal.

1910 founded the MPPC, the General Film Company as a distribution arm. This business practices were introduced later by the major Hollywood studios - were imitated - that emerged from this time in response to the MPPC oligopoly gradually on the west coast. These were for a duration of orders ( "standing orders" ) and zone restrictions. Duration of orders - in the film industry as a block or reactive Book known - undertook film distributors and cinema owners to purchase all movies from a specific manufacturer - or otherwise be allowed to play any movies of the particular manufacturer. The zone restrictions regulated again, that at the same time appearing films of different manufacturers are not competing with each other.

Next was introduced, that new films ( per meter) are more expensive than those which are already in circulation longer. This fostered the emergence of first-run, which were designed more elegant and more services offered than ordinary cinemas, and were correspondingly more expensive.