What is a Copyright?

Posted on May 25, 2007 by Eric Hebert
Filed Under General, Online Branding |

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So yesterday we discussed what intellectual property is.

How do we go about protecting that property?

The government has a website set up to help us with answering that question. According to copyright.gov, a copyright is defined as:

“Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U. S. Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works”.

So what can you copyright? Well, your intellectual property of course! Here’s some examples of what can be copyrighted:

• Literary Works
• Visual Art
• Performing Art
• Sound Recordings
• Periodicals

What do I have to do to get a copyright?

You could register your copyrights with the government. This is the best way to go about doing it, because your telling the government, “Hey, see, I made this!” and they’re putting a stamp of approval on it. However, if your works infringe on another’s copyright, that seal of approval doesn’t mean squat if they can prove they came up with the idea before you.

This does cost some money; however, there are other ways to go about obtaining a copyright.

To put it simply, the second you create an original work, you own the copyright. That’s truth!

However, without some kind of documented notice, how will you prove you own the work? A good way is use what’s referred to as as a “formal notice”. This includes including the following information in any work you create:

• The symbol © (the letter “C” in a circle), or the word “Copyright” or the abbreviation “Copr.”;
• The year of first publication of the work
• The name of the copyright owner

So if you’re a budding musician worried about someone stealing your work, just know that when you lay that track down on a CD, the CD is recording the date you recorded and copyrighted it. Then during printing, make sure to leave a formal copyright notice as well; this goes with pretty much everything you’ll do from that point forward.

While not 100% protected, it’s a small start to letting the world know that you created something original. See my footer - I have one too!

Stay tuned; next week we’ll get into understanding Trademark Law as well as Music Publishing!

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