Page:The copyright act, 1911, annotated.djvu/64

 52 Copyright Acr, 1911.

S 4. sion to public performance, in effect, suppress the work and yet avoid the operation of this section by never de- clining to publish or perform when the demand is made that he shall do so. It may be said that there is a refusal to publish or perform in public when the publication or performance is merely technical and illusorj; or it may be said that there is no publication or public performance unless the conditions are such that the enjoyment of the work is placed within reach of a substantial section of the general public, and not merely within the reach of a few multi-millionaires. To supjiort any argument of this kind, however, the price asked would have to be abso- lutely out of all proportion to usual prices charged. A public performance, however, might be held to be illusory not only on the ground of excessive price, but becauset it was not a serious attempt to stage the work. If a play was to be occasionally performed in some small hall, the actors in plain clothes reading their parts from printed copies of the play, it might well be said that thpre was no public performance within the meaning of this section.

Ownership of 5. — (1 ) Subject to tliG provisioiis of this Act (r)^ copyrig, 'c. ^j^^ author (s) of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright (t) therein : Provided that —

(a) where, in the case of an engraving (?/)^ photograph (x), or portrait, the plate (,y) or other original was ordered by some other person and was made for valu- able consideration in pursuance of that order, then, in the absence of any agreement to the contrary, the person by whom such plate or other

��(?•) Sect. 18.

(*■) Sects. 16 (2), 19 (1), 21.

{t) Sect. 1 (2).

(u) Sect. 35 (1) ("Engravin<rs").

(x) Sect. 35 (1) ("Photog-iaph").

(y) Sect. 35 (1) ("Plate").

�� �