Copyright Question

[Darren_H]

Hi all,
Hope someone can help a newbie out with regards to copyright. Do any of you register copyright for your stories on completion and prior to sending them for submission?

I have read a couple of places that it is considered pretentious to put a copyright symbol on your work when submitting it places (something to which I happen to agree), and this isn't really my major concern as I know that editors and such would rather just pay to publish a decent story than go to any lengths to steal or pass ideas on.

Apart from concerns about sending to dodgy/ phoney competitions and/or publishers, my question arose after I lost a back up disk with a number of stories on it - albeit with password protection on it. In a panic I immediately searched the web and utilised a company called WWOCR and paid for credits to register copyright of my stories.

I know that copyright is granted the moment you put down your ideas on any kind of media, so it's just a case of wondering if anyone else goes to any length to secure copyright on their work or whether it's nothing I should worry too much about.

Apologies if this subject has been covered elsewhere.

 

[HareBrain]

Far as I know, putting a copyright symbol on your work has no effect whatsoever. You have copyright anyway (as you say), the only question is whether you can prove it, if anyone does steal your work. It's not something I worry about, but if it did arise, I assume having earlier drafts of the work would help. I think in any case that this is a hugely exaggerated danger. People have lost entire manuscripts of novels on buses etc (Jilly Cooper's Riders springs to mind) without anyone publishing them.

 

[iansales]

Copyright protection depends on whether you're in the US or UK. In the UK, you cannot register copyright; I think you can do that in the US, however.

In the UK, you own copyright for anything you produce. Many magazines will claim copyright when they publish the story, but it will revert to the author on publication. If someone plagiarises your work, you have to prove that copyright belongs to you - early drafts or working notes are usually sufficient. Signed & sealed copies held by solicitors are a waste of money. Plagiarism is not common because there is little money in it - especially for short stories.

 

[Omphalos]

Ian has stated it correctly. However you may register copyright in the US, but you are not required to. If you wish to the Copyright office will charge you $35 for an e-filing, or, you can just mail the thing to yourself (make sure the USPS clearly cancels your stamps) and keep it sealed in a safe place.

 

[Sapheron]

Of course, it can be held in mind that by making sure that no one dodgy sees any of your work then you're fine anyway. I'm guessing any proof readers are likely to be friends or family; chances are they won't steal your work. As for agents and editors, as long as you use an established company and have a quick read up on them beforehand, which is probably advisable anyway, then you can be sure they won't steal your work either.

 

[Dante]

That is almost correct for copyrights in the United States. You own a copyright for any work you create, complete or incomplete, by virtue of creating it. In a lawsuit over plagiarism, however, you cannot sue for punitive damages in the US without having a registered copyright with the USPTO. The copyright is effective on the date it is registered rather than approved. Keep in mind, a US copyright does not protect work internationally. Typically, an agent or publisher will handle all the details of making sure a work is properly copyrighted for international release.

Putting a (c) symbol on a manuscript can be seen as insulting to an agent. I've read agent blogs that suggest this, but that does not mean that you cannot register the copyright without listing it. If you don't and an agent signs you, then they will handle all the issues of helping you secure a copyright.

 

[RcGrant]

As others have said, make sure you have proof of previous drafts/notes. That's going to be your safest bet, should something ever happen in the future. People have mailed drafts to themselves in the past, and not opened the returned manuscript with the postmark on, just in case.

I find Gmail is awesome for this sort of thing. All of your email just stays on the system, so I often just write an email to myself and attach whatever I am working on. Instant backup (primarily do it in case something goes wrong with all of my laptops at once, but it would be good for this too!).

 

[Darren_H]

Thanks for all the replies. I have plenty of back-ups of everything now (having succumbed to previous laptop wipeouts in the past) and like you, RC, I have sent myself e-mails with drafts attached in case of any major hardware malfunctions. Like I said, my main concern was about losing a back-up disk after moving house so you've all helped to reassure me a bit more - just in case any of my work proves to be any good

 

[iansales]

You're more likely to lose your work from your PC crashing than you are from plagiarism. So making off-site backups - e.g., dumping zip files on an online repository - will kill two birds with one stone.

 

[Peter Graham]

In the UK, unless you actively assign copyright to someone else, you automatically hold the copyright. So, if you are ever asked to sign anything (such as a contract with a publisher or even an agency agreement) check for copyright assignment and/or IP clauses.

There was a debate in here a while ago about whether a literary agent was better placed than a lawyer to advise you on a legal contract. Predictably, the evil lawyers got their usual bashing. But it seems to me that unless you can find someone with genuine experience in both areas, in an ideal world you would want both. An agent will know more about what represents a good deal - the "going rate", royalties, rights and so on, but a lawyer will normally be better placed to advise on the bones of the contract - assignment, termination, jurisdictional issues, severance, entire agreement and all of the so-called "boiler plate" clauses, which are inevitably (and often wrongly) presented as "standard".

The tactic of posting your work to yourself is often derided as "poor man's copyright", on the basis that all it proves is that you sent an envelope to yourself - it doesn't necessarily prove that the contents of that envelope have not been switched or doctored. However, it's still worth doing as part of your general Defence Againist Plagiarism tactics.

But I'd disagree with Ian about leaving a copy with a solicitor. For a start, it isn't expensive - round here, document storage will cost you about £10 per annum (although it will help if you use your existing solicitor or family solicitor if you don't have one yourself). Secondly, in the event of a dispute your solicitor may well be prepared (often for free) to swear an affadavit confirming the date that the document was stored and the fact that it had never been signed out of storage/released to anyone or left the solicitor's office. It would be courteous to tell him or her what you are doing and why when you first make the arrangements.

But, at the end of the day, you needn't worry too much. Most authors don't make much money, so there isn't really much to be gained by stealing someone else's work.

Regards,

Peter