Purchasing a Copyright?

You need to look at the U.S. Copyright statutes, for starters. First thing is, you already have copyright on anything you produce in a tangible form (physical manuscript, computer file, etc., anything no longer existing in your mind, but which somebody else could read). That's automatic. What you don't have is copyright registration. You can get that for a relatively small fee. If you are self-publishing, it would probably be a good idea to do that.

But by all means do the research. Look at the actual statutes. The government site is easy to find.

caw

No, no, and no. You own the copyright on whatever you write. You can register it formally, but that's not necessary.

abbyapplejack said:

I'm starting the process of getting one of my books self-published and the more research I do, the more things I'm finding the internet suggests I need! One of the things I'd been reading about was on buying a copyright for your book. I guess my question is, do you think this is a good idea? Better yet, is it necessary? Will it actually help me protect my rights to the book if someone were to plagiarize it? Is it just a way for creators to have a safeguard on the small chance something like plagiarism happens?

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blacbird said:

You need to look at the U.S. Copyright statutes, for starters. First thing is, you already have copyright on anything you produce in a tangible form (physical manuscript, computer file, etc., anything no longer existing in your mind, but which somebody else could read). That's automatic. What you don't have is copyright registration. You can get that for a relatively small fee. If you are self-publishing, it would probably be a good idea to do that.

But by all means do the research. Look at the actual statutes. The government site is easy to find.

caw

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This link has all the information you'll need. It's the official US Copyright site, set up and maintained by the Library of Congress. Read it. Know it. Live it.

Intellectual property theft is very rare. I also self-published a novella and I did get it a formal copyright from the US Copyright Office. I highly recommend doing this. Not only is it the professional thing to do, but it also doesn't hurt to have that protection.

ewizz31 said:

Intellectual property theft is very rare. I also self-published a novella and I did get it a formal copyright from the US Copyright Office. I highly recommend doing this. Not only is it the professional thing to do, but it also doesn't hurt to have that protection.

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That's not a "formal" copyright. It's not a copyright at all. It's simply a time stamp so you can prove when you wrote the book, or at least when your registered it. This means anyone who claims you stole their property will have to prove they had their material before you registered your own.

It also helps greatly if you have to take someone to court. You can't collect damages without having the book registered, but it's perfectly legal to wait and register it right before you go to court, if you're really worried about the few bucks it costs.

In general, people who are most worried about copyright are the ones who have the least risk of it being violated. There's rarely enough money to get the lawyers to even take your phone calls.

Jeff

abbyapplejack said:

Hmm. Thanks everyone! I'll have to look into this some more but I'm leaning towards going without one until it's necessary.

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You need to register the book as soon as you're ready to publish it. Just because it isn't a copyright does not mean you don't need it. You do need it, probably more than those of us who use mainstream publishers. I never have to register anything because all those places that buy my fiction handle this for me. But you have to do it yourself, and it should be done before you actually publish the book. It's cheap, it's a good safeguard, and it's really required in some ways.

Jamesaritchie said:

You need to register the book as soon as you're ready to publish it.

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Most send in for registrations after it has actually pubbed.

Super_Duper said:

Most send in for registrations after it has actually pubbed.

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You shouldn't. IF you're self-publishing, and IF you want to register, then you do it before you take the book live, just like commercial publishers do. If you're wanting an added layer of protection, then it's silly to wait until after you've made your work vulnerable by putting it in front of the same people you think might have an interest in stealing it.

Jamesaritchie said:

You need to register the book as soon as you're ready to publish it. Just because it isn't a copyright does not mean you don't need it. You do need it, probably more than those of us who use mainstream publishers. I never have to register anything because all those places that buy my fiction handle this for me. But you have to do it yourself, and it should be done before you actually publish the book. It's cheap, it's a good safeguard, and it's really required in some ways.

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By US law, not necessarily. As stated by the US Copyright Office:

Registration (or a refusal to register) is a prerequisite to filing a lawsuit for copyright infringement involving a U.S. work.

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The Copyright Office link above includes some of the legal precedent for this.

There's a huge "but" to this. If you go to the Copyright Office's e-registration Web site, the page reports:

Current Processing Time

• Processing Time for e-Filing: generally, up to 8 months
• Processing Time for Paper Forms: generally, up to 13 months

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This is not a rapid process, and if your work is being infringed, then it will take up to that long before you can sue for damages.

So you don't have to do it right away. But if you don't, there's consequences.

I recently had a book plagiarized, and I hadn't registered the copyright, and it made no difference.

There just wasn't enough money involved to justify the cost of suing for copyright violation. I had no idea who the plagiarist was, or what country s/he was in, or whether s/he had any assets to go after, or anything else. I twould have cost me thousands and thousands of dollars to even TRY to go after the plagiarists, so I just contacted the stores where the plagiarized novel was being sold and they took it down. Not satisfying, but realistic.

(Interestingly, I have about twenty books out with publishers and, at the time, only one self-published book, and it was the self-published book that was plagiarized. So possibly the most effective protection against plagiarism isn't registering copyright, but rather having a publisher scaring plagiarists off!)

Jamesaritchie said:

You need to register the book as soon as you're ready to publish it. Just because it isn't a copyright does not mean you don't need it. You do need it, probably more than those of us who use mainstream publishers. I never have to register anything because all those places that buy my fiction handle this for me. But you have to do it yourself, and it should be done before you actually publish the book. It's cheap, it's a good safeguard, and it's really required in some ways.

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Bad advice, James.

Cyia said:

You shouldn't. IF you're self-publishing, and IF you want to register, then you do it before you take the book live, just like commercial publishers do. If you're wanting an added layer of protection, then it's silly to wait until after you've made your work vulnerable by putting it in front of the same people you think might have an interest in stealing it.

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Yep.

Also, if you register the copyright as soon as you're ready then the book is accepted for publication, and ends up being substantially reworked, there's a good argument to be made for having to re-register the book. So what's the point in doing it sooner?

Captcha said:

(Interestingly, I have about twenty books out with publishers and, at the time, only one self-published book, and it was the self-published book that was plagiarized. So possibly the most effective protection against plagiarism isn't registering copyright, but rather having a publisher scaring plagiarists off!)

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I suspect that plagiarisers know publishers tend to have legal teams on standby, who will vigorously defend their company's works; while self-published writers are less likely to have access to strong legal representation and so make easier targets. I could be wrong. But I've heard the same from several other writers.

robjvargas said:

This is not a rapid process, and if your work is being infringed, then it will take up to that long before you can sue for damages.

So you don't have to do it right away. But if you don't, there's consequences.

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You can sue and win wothout having registered, but the punitive damages are potentially higher if the work is registered within the legal window as specified in Title 17.

AW Admin said:

You can sue and win wothout having registered, but the punitive damages are potentially higher if the work is registered within the legal window as specified in Title 17.

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In my decidedly non-lawyerly reading of the Copyright Office's documentation, you can't sue for punitive damages without registration. However, without registration, you can sue for lost... I forget the term... I'll call it "wages" until I remember.

That's how I read it, anyway.

Cyia said:

You shouldn't. IF you're self-publishing, and IF you want to register, then you do it before you take the book live, just like commercial publishers do. If you're wanting an added layer of protection, then it's silly to wait until after you've made your work vulnerable by putting it in front of the same people you think might have an interest in stealing it.

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Wrong. I've worked in publishing for almost 20 years. Standard practice is to file the copyright and send in two copies once it is published.

Isn't the correct phrasing "register copyright" not "a copyright"?