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32 MOVING PICTURE WORLD May 7, 1921 Exhibitors, Distributors, Producers Are You Willing to Move and Move Now to Save Your Industry from Ruin? "Unless all elements of the moving picture business unite and come to a common understanding and a solution of their problems in less than ten years there will be no motion picture business." These are the words of the best informed man in the picture business today. His is not the first warning note but it is the most important because he knows precisely what he is talking about. More men of importance in the industry know this today than ever knew it before. There are those who Will never know it until it happens and then their amazement won't make any difference in the result. The chief essentials are stability, a respect for contracts, an appreciation that the square way is the really clever way to do business and a frank and early correction of the evils that beset and hamper our progress, evils that make for distrust, hatreds and bitterness. In the situation neither the producer, distributor nor exhibitor is blameless. Some way must be found to enable the actual and final sale of goods by the salesman. Some way must be found to prevent the taking of a contract to a competitor for the purpose of price advances. So long as the system exists there will be war between producer and exhibitor. On the other hand some way must be found to prevent the contracting for pictures that won't be given play dates. This is an evil as great as the other. The matter of contracts must be settled and the exhibitor is absolutely right in insisting upon it. The producer and distributor are poor business men in the broad sense just so long as they delay this adju stment. Any method that is fair and just and equitable will serve, but some method must be speedily found. A system of arbitration similar to that now in successful operation in the Minnesota territory must be adopted for every territory in the United States. This system has been found fair to exhibitor, distributor and producer and there is no other territory where such a plan is in real effect. A solution of the cash deposit system must be found. It will be a system where the distributor will be sure of his money on the one hand and where the exhibitor's money will not be tied up for a producer's use on the other. An effective, year in and year out method for fighting censorship must be developed and put into operation so that there will be no last minute, panicky arrangements that result in stupid mistakes in critical hours. In this as in other needs the exhibitor, distributor and producer must see eye to eye and work shoulder to shoulder without personal jealousies or dissension. The program of clean films and clean advertising must be enforced upon all alike no matter how big or how little they are. Politics must be replaced by co-operation, battles must give way to calm constructive conferences, fair play must supplant the trickery that seems smart but which really is miserably poor business.