PUBLISHING, HISTORY OF

an account of the selection, preparation, and marketing of printed matter from its origins in ancient times to the present. The activity has grown from small beginnings into a vast and complex industry responsible for the dissemination of all manner of cultural material; its impact upon civilization is impossible to calculate. This article treats the history and development of book, newspaper, and magazine publishing in its technical and commercial aspects. The preparation and dissemination of written communication is followed from its beginnings in the ancient world to the modern period. For additional information on the preparation of early manuscripts, see writing. A more detailed examination of printing technology can be found in printing. The dissemination of published material via electronic media is treated in information processing. For a discussion of reference-book publishing, see the articles encyclopaedia; dictionary. Additional reading General works David M. Brownstone and Irene M. Franck, The Dictionary of Publishing (1982); and Jean Peters (ed.), The Bookman's Glossary, 6th rev. and enlarged ed. (1983), explain terminology, the former emphasizing business aspects. Colin Clair, A History of Printing in Britain (1966), and A History of European Printing (1976), are useful for early periods. S.H. Steinberg, Five Hundred Years of Printing, 3rd ed. (1974), is comprehensive; it may be supplemented by Robin Myers and Michael Harris (eds.), A Millennium of the Book: Production, Design & Illustration in Manuscript & Print, 9001900 (1994), which, despite its title, treats more than books. John W. Seybold, The World of Digital Typesetting (1984), charts the history of various printing techniques from the earliest days to the 1980s and emphasizes the importance of computers. Hugh Evison Look (ed.), Electronic Publishing: A Snapshot of the Early 1980s (1983), surveys the state of the art at the time. Philip Hills (ed.), The Future of the Printed Word: The Impact and the Implications of the New Communications Technology (1980), discusses the relationship of publishing and computer technology. Also useful are Martin Greenberger (ed.), Electronic Publishing Plus: Media for a Technological Future (1985); George E. Whitehouse, Understanding the New Technologies of the Mass Media (1986); and Oldrich Standera, The Electronic Era of Publishing: An Overview of Concepts, Technologies, and Methods (1987).Legal aspects of the industry are explored in W.J. Leaper, Copyright and Performing Rights (1957), an early history of copyright in England and the implications of the Berne Convention and the Universal Copyright Convention; Allen Kent and Harold Lancour (eds.), Copyright: Current Viewpoints on History, Laws, Legislation (1972), a collection of essays from professional sources; Richard Wincor and Irving Mandell, Copyright, Patents, and Trademarks: The Protection of Intellectual and Industrial Property (1980), a history of copyright in the United States; Denis De Freitas, The Copyright System: Practice and Problems in Developing Countries (1983), a survey of key principles and practices; Lee Boaz Hall, International Magazine and Book Licensing (1983); and two authoritative textbooks published by the Practising Law Institute: Richard Dannay and E. Gabriel Perle (eds.), Legal and Business Aspects of Book Publishing (1986); and Peter C. Gould and Stephen H. Gross (eds.), Legal and Business Aspects of the Magazine Industry (1984). Copyright Bulletin (quarterly), published by UNESCO, presents current information on worldwide copyright practices.Allen Kent et al. (eds.), Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science, 35 vol. (196883), continued with supplemental volumes, provides comprehensive information on many aspects of publishing. Another valuable reference source for current information is The Bowker Annual of Library & Book Trade Information. Vito J. Brenni, The Art and History of Book Printing: A Topical Bibliography (1984), Book Illustration and Decoration: A Guide to Research (1980), Book Printing in Britain and America: A Guide to the Literature and a Directory of Printers (1983), and Bookbinding, a Guide to the Literature (1982), are bibliographical guides for further study. Book publishing The literature on book publishing and the culture of print is reviewed in two essays in Robert Darnton, The Kiss of Lamourette: Reflections in Cultural History (1990): What Is the History of Books?, pp. 107135, and First Steps Toward a History of Reading, pp. 154187. The impact of literacy on Western modes of thought is discussed in Eric A. Havelock, Origins of Western Literacy (1976); and Walter J. Ong, Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word (1982, reissued 1991). General works on the history of the book, which examine technical and commercial developments and the impact of the book on European culture, include Lucien Febvre and Henri-Jean Martin, The Coming of the Book: The Impact of Printing, 14501800 (1976, reissued 1990; originally published in French, 1958); and Elizabeth Eisenstein, The Printing Press as an Agent of Change, 2 vols. (1979). The last has been influential but also controversial; a penetrating critique is Anthony T. Grafton, The Importance of Being Printed, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 11(2):265286 (Autumn 1980). Major case studies of the history of the book include Richard D. Altick, The English Common Reader: A Social History of the Mass Reading Public, 18001900 (1957, reissued 1983); Roger Chartier, The Cultural Uses of Print in Early Modern France, trans. from French (1987); Robert Darnton, The Literary Underground of the Old Regime (1982), and The Forbidden Best-sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (1995); Carla Hesse, Publishing and Cultural Politics in Revolutionary Paris, 17891810 (1991); and Alvin Kernan, Samuel Johnson & the Impact of Print (1989). The impact of electronic media on the book's place in Western culture is hotly debated; these works provide an overview: Alvin Kernan, The Death of Literature (1990); Geoffrey Nunberg, The Places of Books in the Age of Electronic Reproduction, Representations, 42:1337 (Spring 1993); and Geoffrey Nunberg (ed.), The Future of the Book (1996).The history of the publishing industries of various individual countries is chronicled in John Feather, The Provincial Book Trade in Eighteenth-Century England (1985); John Feather, A History of British Publishing (1988); Gary Marker, Publishing, Printing, and the Origins of Intellectual Life in Russia, 17001800 (1985); K.S. Duggal, Book Publishing in India (1980); Vinod Kumar (ed.), Book Industry in India: Problems & Prospects (1980); Eduard Kimman, Indonesian Publishing: Economic Organizations in a Langganan Society (1981); S.I.A. Kotei, The Book Today in Africa (1981); George L. Parker, The Beginnings of the Book Trade in Canada (1985); Hellmut Lehmann-Haupt, The Book in America: A History of the Making and Selling of Books in the United States, 2nd rev. ed. (1951; originally published in German, 1937); John Tebbel, A History of Book Publishing in the United States, 4 vol. (197281); and Donald Franklin Joyce, Gatekeepers of Black Culture: Black-Owned Book Publishing in the United States, 18171981 (1983). Comprehensive information on the history and character of American book publishers is gathered in two reference sources, both prepared by Peter Dzwonkoski (ed.), American Literary Publishing Houses, 16381899, 2 vol. (1986), and American Literary Publishing Houses, 19001980: Trade and Paperback (1986).Publishing of paperbacks is the subject of Allen Billy Crider (ed.), Mass Market Publishing in America (1982); Kenneth C. Davis, Two-Bit Culture: The Paperbacking of America (1984); Clarence Petersen, The Bantam Story: Thirty Years of Paperback Publishing, 2nd rev. ed. (1975); and William H. Lyles, Putting Dell on the Map: A History of the Dell Paperbacks (1983). Production of special kinds of books is discussed in Joan Lyons, Artists' Books: A Critical Anthology and Sourcebook (1985), an overview of the genre of book art; Walter W. Powell, Getting into Print: The Decision-Making Process in Scholarly Publishing (1985); International Conference on Scholarly Publishing, Proceedings from the 3rd International Conference on Scholarly Publishing (1983); and Alan Marshall Meckler, Micropublishing: A History of Scholarly Micropublishing in America, 19381980 (1982).The following are histories of individual publishing firms, some compiled by the companies themselves: Butterworths (firm), Butterworths: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow (1977); Philip Wallis, At the Sign of the Ship: Notes on the House of Longman, 17241974 (1974); Peter Sutcliffe, The Oxford University Press: An Informal History (1978); M.H. Black, Cambridge University Press, 15841984 (1984), a definitive history, supplemented by David McKitterick, Four Hundred Years of University Printing and Publishing in Cambridge, 15841984 (1984), an exhibition catalogue; Eugene Exman, The House of Harper: One Hundred and Fifty Years of Publishing (1967), with coverage of early U.S. copyright complications; Thomas Bonaventure Lawler, Seventy Years of Textbook Publishing: A History of Ginn and Company (1938); Russell Freedman, Holiday House: The First Fifty Years (1985), the history of a publisher of children's books; John Hammond Moore, Wiley, One Hundred and Seventy Five Years of Publishing (1982); and Peter Schwed, Turning the Pages: An Insider's Story of Simon & Schuster, 19241984 (1984).Marketing aspects are emphasized in Charles Lee, The Hidden Public: The Story of the Book-of-the-Month Club (1958, reprinted 1973), a cultural and business history; William M. Childs and Donald E. McNeil (eds.), American Books Abroad: Toward a National Policy (1986), with information on cultural diplomacy; Alberto E. Augsburger, The Latin American Book Market: Problems and Prospects (1981); and William E. Freeman, Soviet Book Exports, 197382 (1984), a research report published by the U.S. Information Agency. Newspaper publishing General accounts of the world press are offered in Francis Williams, The Right to Know: The Rise of the World Press (1969); John C. Merrill, Carter R. Bryan, and Marvin Alisky, The Foreign Press: A Survey of the World's Journalism (1970), concentrating on newspapers but also containing some data on magazines; William Ludlow Chenery, Freedom of the Press (1955, reprinted 1977); World Communications: A 200-Country Survey of Press, Radio, Television, and Film, 5th ed. (1975); Anthony Smith, The Newspaper: An International History (1979); Anthony Smith (ed.), Newspapers and Democracy: International Essays on a Changing Medium (1980); John C. Merrill and Harold A. Fisher, The World's Great Dailies (1980); and Cyril Bainbridge (ed.), One Hundred Years of Journalism: Social Aspects of the Press (1984). Business aspects are discussed in W. Parkman Rankin, The Practice of Newspaper Management (1986); and Benjamin M. Compaine, The Newspaper Industry in the 1980s: An Assessment of Economics and Technology (1980).Newspaper publishing in Britain is discussed in Michael Harris and Alan Lee (eds.), The Press in English Society from the Seventeenth to Nineteenth Centuries (1986); Lucy Brown, Victorian News and Newspapers (1985); Graham Storey, Reuters' Century, 18511951 (1951, reprinted 1969), a history including information on important U.S. agencies; James Curran, The British Press: A Manifesto (1978); Simon Jenkins, Newspapers: The Power and the Money (1979), and The Market for Glory: Fleet Street Ownership in the Twentieth Century (1986); Alastair Hetherington, News, Newspapers, and Television (1985); and David Goodhart and Patrick Wintour, Eddie Shah and the Newspaper Revolution (1986), an account of the first electronically produced national newspaper.The press of the United States is analyzed in Benjamin M. Compaine et al., Who Owns the Media?: Concentration of Ownership in the Mass Communications Industry, 2nd rev. ed. (1982); Loren Ghiglione (ed.), The Buying and Selling of America's Newspapers (1984); Peter Benjaminson, Death in the Afternoon: America's Newspaper Giants Struggle for Survival (1984); Richard Kluger, The Paper: The Life and Death of the New York Herald Tribune (1986); Marilyn McAdams Sibley, Lone Stars and State Gazettes: Texas Newspapers Before the Civil War (1983); and Daniel F. Littlefield, Jr., and James W. Parins, American Indian and Alaska Native Newspapers and Periodicals, 3 vol. (198486).Susan Goldenberg, The Thomson Empire (1984), is a business history of one of the largest Canadian newspaper corporations. Les Carlyon, Paper Chase: The Press Under Investigation (1982), is a study of newspaper publishing in Australia. The press of Third World countries is the subject of E. Lloyd Sommerlad, The Press in Developing Countries (1966); and John A. Lent (ed.), Newspapers in Asia: Contemporary Trends and Problems (1982). Magazine publishing Ruari McLean, Magazine Design (1969), presents a collection of the covers of famous American and European magazines. Studies of magazine publishing in various individual countries include, on Great Britain, Cynthia L. White, Women's Magazines, 16931968 (1970), and The Women's Periodical Press in Britain, 19461976 (1977); and Alvin Sullivan (ed.), British Literary Magazines, 4 vol. (198386); on the United States, Theodore Peterson, Magazines in the Twentieth Century, 2nd ed. (1964); Walter C. Daniel, Black Journals in the United States (1982); James P. Danky (ed.), Native American Periodicals and Newspapers, 18281982: Bibliography, Publishing Record, and Holdings (1984); Edward E. Chielens (ed.), American Literary Magazines: The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (1986); and James Playsted Wood, Of Lasting Interest: The Story of the Reader's Digest (1958, reprinted 1975); on Canada, Noel Robert Barbour, Those Amazing People!: The Story of the Canadian Magazine Industry, 17781967 (1982); and, on Germany, Ernst Behler, Die Zeitschriften der Bruder Schlegel: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der deutschen Romantik (1983).Scholarly journals are discussed in E.C. Slater, Biochimica et Biophysica Acta: The Story of a Biochemical Journal (1986), which also includes details of publishing in The Netherlands; and Jill Lambert, Scientific and Technical Journals (1985). Michael L. Cook, Mystery, Detective, and Espionage Magazines (1983), describes more than 400 American, British, and Canadian magazines of the genre, with brief listings for several other countries.Business aspects of magazine publishing are the subject of J. William Click and Russell N. Baird, Magazine Editing and Production, 4th ed. (1986); Benjamin M. Compaine, The Business of Consumer Magazines (1982); and W. Parkman Rankin and Eugene Sauve Waggaman, Jr., Business Management of General Consumer Magazines, 2nd ed. (1984). Current coverage is found in Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management (monthly, with special issues). George Unwin Philip Soundy Unwin David H. Tucker The Editors of the Encyclopdia Britannica Book publishing Modern publishing: from the 19th century to the present The 19th century In the 19th century a whole new era in publishing began. A series of technical developments, in the book trade as in other industries, dramatically raised output and lowered costs. Stereotyping, the iron press, the application of steam power, mechanical typecasting and typesetting, new methods of reproducing illustrationsthese inventions, developed through the century and often resisted by the printer, amounted to a revolution in book production. Paper, made by hand up to 1800, formed more than 20 percent of the cost of a book in 1740; by 1910 it had fallen to a little more than 7 percent. Bindings, too, became less expensive. After 1820 cloth cases began to be used in place of leather, and increasingly the publisher issued his books already bound. Previously, he had done so only with less expensive books; the bindings of others had been left to the bookseller or private buyer. In Europe and America, expansion and competition were the essence of the century, and the book trade had a full share of both. While the population of Europe doubled, that of the United States increased fifteenfold. Improved means of communication led to wider distribution, and a thirst for self-improvement and entertainment greatly expanded readership, leading to a rapid growth in every category of book from the scholarly to the juvenile. The interplay of technical innovation and social change was never closer. As the development of the railways encouraged people to travel, a demand arose for reading material to lessen the tedium of the long journeys. The only victim in the book trade was design, part of the price that was paid almost universally in the first phase of machine production. Publishing was now well established, with its characteristic blend of commerce and idealism. Their tendency to specialize made French and German publishers more vulnerable to change than their British colleagues, who aimed as a rule at greater flexibility. Literary and intellectual currents were flowing strongly and the number of new books rose by leaps and bounds. Rough figures for Britain indicate 100 new titles per year up to about 1750, rising to 600 by 1825, and to 6,000 before the end of the century. Equally characteristic was the appearance of popular series at low prices, literature for the millions, as Archibald Constable was the first to call it. The forerunner was the publisher John Bell's The Poets of Great Britain (rivaling Dr. Johnson's), which appeared in 177783, in 109 volumes at six shillings each, when even a slim volume usually cost a guinea or more. By the 1850s the application of the new techniques of mass production had brought down the price of an inexpensive reprint to one shilling, as in the Railway Library of novels (George Routledge, 1,300 vol., 184898), for instance, or in the three series of classics issued by H.G. Bohn in 1846, 1850, and 1853. Later reprints were cheaper still. Least expensive was Cassell's National Library (209 vol., 188690), bound in paper for threepence and in cloth for sixpencethat is, one-twelfth the price of the Bell set. On the Continent, two German series were outstanding. The Tauchnitz Collection of British and American Authors (18411939) became known to thousands of travelers. Tauchnitz voluntarily paid royalties and forbade the sale of his editions in Britain. Even more successful was Reclams Universal-Bibliothek, begun in 1867. An important factor in this series, as in others later, was the release of works through the expiration of copyright. Book piracy In the United States, publishing gradually became centralized in a few citiesPhiladelphia, Boston, and New York City. Although American literature put down strong roots during the 19th century, piracy from Britain rose to great heights. There was sharp competition to be the first to secure proofs of any important new book. Publishers waiting at the dockside for new British books could produce an American edition almost within hours, as they did in 1823 with Sir Walter Scott's Peveril of the Peak. In the absence of international copyright agreements, the British author usually received nothing, but there were honourable exceptions; Harper Brothers, for instance, paid considerable royalties to Charles Dickens and Thomas Macaulay, among others. There was also at least one famous case of piracy in reverse. When Harriet Beecher Stowe's antislavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin came out in the United States in 1852, 1,500,000 copies rapidly appeared in England, some editions selling for sixpence. Though it can be argued by some people that piracy is not only inevitable but possibly even desirable for the sake of cultural diffusion in some circumstances, the availability of inexpensive foreign books, if prolonged as it almost certainly was in the United States, can damage the prospects for home-produced literature. Though there were some household names, such as Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, American writers in general had a lean time; and the strong development of the magazine short story and the lecture tour in the United States has been attributed in part to their difficulties. Toward the end of the century American publishing was further enriched by translations of many foreign works, as a result of the flood of immigrants into New York City. Magazine publishing Beginnings in the 17th century Though there may have been published material similar to a magazine in antiquity, especially perhaps in China, the magazine as it is now known began only after the invention of printing in the West. It had its roots in the spate of pamphlets, broadsides, ballads, chapbooks, and almanacs that printing made possible. Much of the energy that went into these gradually became channeled into publications that appeared regularly and collected a variety of material designed to appeal to particular interests. The magazine thus came to occupy the large middle ground, incapable of sharp definition, between the book and the newspaper. The earliest magazine appears to have been the German Erbauliche Monaths-Unterredungen (166368; Edifying Monthly Discussions), started by Johann Rist, a theologian and poet of Hamburg. Soon after there appeared a group of learned periodicals: the Journal des Savans (later Journal des Savants; 1665), started in France by the author Denis de Sallo; the Philosophical Transactions (1665) of the Royal Society in England; and the Giornale de' letterati (1668), published in Italy and issued by the scholar and ecclesiastic Francesco Nazzari. A similar journal was started in Germany a little later, the Acta eruditorum Lipsiensium (Leipzig; 1682); and mention may also be made of the exile-French Nouvelles de la Rpublique des Lettres (1684), published by the philosopher Pierre Bayle mainly in Holland to escape censorship. These sprang from the revival of learning, the need to review its fruits, and the wish to diffuse its spirit as widely as possible. The learned journals summarized important new books, but there were as yet no literary reviews. Book advertisements, by about 1650 a regular feature of the newssheets, sometimes had brief comments added, and regular catalogs began to appear, such as the English quarterly Mercurius librarius, or A Catalogue of Books (166870). But in the 17th century the only periodicals devoted to books were short-lived: the Weekly Memorials for the Ingenious (168283), which offered some critical notes on books, and the Universal Historical Bibliothque (JanuaryMarch 1686). The latter invited scholarly contributions and could thus be regarded as the true forerunner of the literary review. The lighter type of magazine, or periodical of amusement, may be dated from 1672, which saw the first appearance of Le Mercure Galant (renamed Mercure de France in 1714). It was founded by the writer Jean Donneau de Viz and contained court news, anecdotes, and short pieces of versea recipe that was to prove endlessly popular and become widely imitated. This was followed in 1688 by a German periodical with an unwieldy title but one that well expressed the intention behind many a subsequent magazine: Entertaining and Serious, Rational and Unsophisticated Ideas on All Kinds of Agreeable and Useful Books and Subjects. It was issued in Leipzig by the jurist Christian Thomasius, who made a point of encouraging women readers. England was next in the field, with a penny weekly, the Athenian Gazette (better known later as the Athenian Mercury; 169097), run by a London publisher, John Dunton, to resolve all the most Nice and Curious Questions. Soon after came the Gentleman's Journal (169294), started by the French-born Peter Anthony Motteux, with a monthly blend of news, prose, and poetry. In 1693, after devoting some experimental numbers of the Athenian Mercury to the Fair Sex, Dunton brought out the first magazine specifically for women, the Ladies' Mercury. Finally, another note, taken up time and again later, was struck by The London Spy (16981700), issued by a tavern keeper, Ned Ward, and containing a running narrative of the sights and sounds of London. Developments in the 18th century Great Britain With increasing literacyespecially among womenand a quickening interest in new ideas, the magazine filled out and became better established. In Britain, three early essay periodicals had enormous influence: Daniel Defoe's The Review (170413; thrice weekly); Sir Richard Steele's The Tatler (170911; thrice weekly), to which Joseph Addison soon contributed; and Addison and Steele's The Spectator (171112, briefly revived in 1714; daily). Though they resembled newspapers in the frequency of their appearance, they were more like magazines in content. The Review introduced the opinion-forming political article on domestic and foreign affairs, while the cultivated essays of The Tatler and The Spectator, designed to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality, did much to shape the manners and taste of the age. The latter had countless imitators not only in Britain, where there were in addition the Female Tatler (170910) and the Female Spectator (174446), but also on the Continent and later in America. The Stamp Tax of 1712 had a damping effect, as intended, but magazines proved endlessly resilient, easy to start and easy to fail, then as now. So far various themes had been tried out; they were first brought together convincingly by the English printer Edward Cave, who began to publish The Gentleman's Magazine in 1731. It was originally a monthly collection of essays and articles culled from elsewhere, hence the term magazinethe first use of the word in this context. Cave was joined in 1738 by Dr. Johnson, who was later to publish his own Rambler (175052); thereafter The Gentleman's Magazine contained mostly original matter, including parliamentary reports. Rivals and imitators quickly followed, notably the London Magazine (173285) and the Scots Magazine (17391817; to 1826 published as the Edinburgh Magazine); and, among the increasing number of women's periodicals, there were a Ladies' Magazine (174953) and a Lady's Magazine (17701832). Their progenitor, however, outlived them all and perished only in 1907. The literary and political rivalries of the day produced numerous short-lived periodicals, from which the critical review emerged as an established form. Robert Dodsley, a London publisher, started the Museum (174647), devoted mainly to books, and Ralph Griffiths, a Nonconformist bookseller, founded The Monthly Review (17491845), which had the novelist and poet Oliver Goldsmith as a contributor. To oppose the latter on behalf of the Tories and the Church of England, The Critical Review (17561817) was started by an Edinburgh printer, Archibald Hamilton, with the novelist Tobias Smollett as its first editor. Book reviews tended to be long and fulsome, with copious quotations; a more astringent note came in only with the founding of the Edinburgh Review in 1802 (see below). Magazine publishing The 20th century The advertising revolution in popular magazines There was a certain resistance to advertising in magazines, in keeping with their literary affinities. When the advertisement tax in Britain was repealed in 1853 and more advertising began to appear, the Athenaeum thought fit to say: It is the duty of an independent journal to protect as far as possible the credulous, confiding and unwary from the wily arts of the insidious advertiser. In the United States many magazines, such as Harper's, took a high line with would-be advertisers until the 1880s; and Reader's Digest, with its mammoth circulation, admitted advertisements to its American edition only in 1955. Yet today some sectors of the magazine industry are dominated by advertising, and few are wholly free from its influence. Magazine advertising economics In the United States Cyrus Curtis showed what could be achieved in attracting advertising revenue with the Saturday Evening Post. He bought the magazine for $1,000 in 1897, when it was on its last legs, and invested $1,250,000 of his profits from the Ladies' Home Journal before it finally caught on. But when it did, through an appeal based on well-founded stories and articles about the business world, a prime interest at the time, its success was enormous; by 1922 it had a circulation of more than 2,000,000 and an advertising revenue in excess of $28,000,000. It was a classic demonstration of modern magazine economics: as circulation rose in the initial phase of low advertising rates, money had to be poured in to meet the cost of producing more copies; but, as soon as high advertising rates could be justified by a high circulation, profitability was assured. Conversely, when high rates are maintained on a falling circulation, it is the advertisers who lose, until they withdraw their support. Once circulation figures became all-important, advertisers naturally asserted their right to verify them. The first attempt, made in 1899 by the Association of American Advertisers, only lasted until 1913, but fresh initiatives in 1914 created the Audit Bureau of Circulation. Though resented at first by publishers, it was eventually seen as a guarantee of their claims. Interest in circulation led publishers into market research. The first organization for this purpose was set up by the Curtis Publishing Company in 1911; but such research did not become general until the 1930s. Reader research, to ascertain what readers wanted from magazines, was also developed in the 1930s and proved to be a useful tool, though no substitute for editorial flair. As was once observed by the features editor of Vogue: If we find out what people want, it's already too late. Thus the popular magazine in the United States, expanding with the economy, became part of the marketing system. By 1900 advertisements might form up to 50 percent of its contents; by 1947, the proportion was more often 65 percent. A proprietor was no longer just selling attractive editorial matter to a segment of the public; he was also selling a well-charted segment of the public to the advertiser. Though the process was most pronounced in the United States, a vast country where, in the absence of national newspapers, national magazines had a special function, the same principles came to apply, in varying degrees, in Europe. The effects of advertising on the appearance of the magazine have been, on the whole, stimulating. At the turn of the century, advertisements began to move forward from the back pages into greater prominence among the editorial matter, and this was often regretted by readers. At the same time, advertising agencies were developing from mere space sellers into copywriters and designers; their efforts to produce work of high visual appeal forced editors to make their own editorial typography and layout more attractive. The use of colour, in particular, was greatly fostered by advertisers once they discovered its effectiveness. In the 1880s colour printing was rare, but, after the development of the multicolour rotary press in the 1890s, it steadily became more common. By 1948 nearly half the advertising pages of the leading American magazines were in two or more colours. The effect of advertising on editorial content is harder to analyze. Advertisers have not been slow to exercise financial pressure and have often succeeded in suppressing material or modifying policy. In 1940, for instance, Esquire lost its piano advertisements after publishing an article recommending the guitar for musical accompaniment; six months later it tried to win them back with a rueful editorial apology. Yet many magazines, notably the Saturday Evening Post, Time, and The New Yorker, have persistently asserted editorial independence. Something like a balance of power has come into being, which can tip either way. What can safely be said is that advertising pressure as a whole has been a socially conservative force, playing on conformity, inclining magazines to work on the principle of minimum offense, and holding them back from radical editorial departures until they are clearly indicated by changes in public taste. This has tended to make the large-circulation magazine an exploiter rather than a discoverer of fresh talent or new ideas. Yet in the last analysis, advertisers have been forced to recognize that magazines, like newspapers, cannot forgo too much of their independence without forfeiting the loyalty of their readers and hence their value as an advertising medium. Newspaper publishing A community needs news, said the British author Dame Rebecca West, for the same reason that a man needs eyes. It has to see where it is going. For William Randolph Hearst, one of America's most important newspaper publishers, news was what someone wants to stop you printing: all the rest is ads. Both idealistic and mercenary motives have contributed to the development of modern newspapers, which continue to attract millions of regular readers throughout the world despite stern competition from radio and television. Modern electronics, which has put a television set in almost every home in the Western world, has also revolutionized the newspaper publishing process, allowing many more newspapers to be born. An increasing number of these new newspapers are given away free, their production costs being borne entirely by the revenue from advertisements, which are of much greater importance than they were in Hearst's day. Newspapers can be published daily or weekly, in the morning or in the afternoon; they may be published for the few hundred inhabitants of a small town, for a whole country, or even for an international market. A newspaper differs from other types of publication by its immediacy, characteristic headlines, and coverage of a miscellany of topical issues and events. According to the Royal Commission on the Press in Great Britain, to qualify as news an event must first be interesting to the public, and the public for this purpose means for each paper the people who read that paper. But the importance of newspapers stretches far beyond a passing human interest in events. In the 19th century the first independent newspapers contributed significantly to the spread of literacy and of the concepts of human rights and democratic freedoms. Newspapers continue to shape opinions in the global village of the late 20th century, where international preoccupations are frequently of concern to the individual, and where individual tragedies are often played out on an international stage. Since it is commonly held that individuals have a right to know enough about what is happening to be able to participate in public life, the newspaper journalist is deemed to have a duty to inform. Whenever this public right to know comes under attack, a heavy responsibility falls on the journalist. Origins and early evidences The daily newspaper is essentially the product of an industrialized society. In its independent form, the newspaper is usually integral to the development of democracy. The newspaper thus defined was fairly late in emerging, since it depended on a certain basic freedom of speech and relatively widespread literacy.