You may be under the false impression that before you can get
your text published, you must "get the copyright" to your own
written material. You might also think that in order to get the
copyright, you must "apply" for it. This is just not so. In the
following few paragraphs, I'll give you some simple facts about
copyrights that may help you in your quest to get published.
First, it is important to understand that you cannot "copyright"
an idea; you can only copyright what you have written. That is,
you might have just written the greatest self-help manual on how
to breed guppies. And you did, indeed, file for your copyright
with the Library of Congress. Three weeks after completing the
formal copyrighting process, you find out that the manager of
your neighborhood pet store (where you've been buying your
guppies) has just sold the TV rights to a new hit show "Breeding
Guppies" and he is using many of the same principles that you've
outlined in your manual on how to go about guppy breeding. So,
naturally, since this is the 21st Century and you live in
America, you want to sue the guy. You think you have a sure
thing, and you are dreaming of the million-dollar award that the
jury is sure to give you. But…you'd better not put a down
payment on that Guppy Farm in Iowa just yet. The manual you
wrote, the exact words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs, and
chapters that you wrote, belong to you. It is illegal for anyone
to reproduce or use any of that text, in part or in whole, for
profit without your permission. However, you must be able to
prove that your exact words have been stolen before you can get
an award for copyright infringement. So, you know that guy with
his hit TV series? Well, unless he's reading from your manual
word-for-word, or attempting to sell your manual as a
supplemental text that he's written, then he's probably doing
nothing illegal. He's just using the idea of breeding guppies.
You do "own" the copyright to your text, all its words and
clever phrases. And you don't even have to file with the Library
of Congress in order to have the copyright on your text. The
copyright is conferred upon you the minute you write your New
York Times Bestseller. All you have to do is be able to prove,
beyond any doubt, the date that you wrote the material. For your
protection, then, it is wise to print and date your material,
and establish with a third party through a written communication
that you have just finished your text. At that time, you can
legally affix the copyright symbol (the letter c inside a
circle) to your work. Now here's where a formal copyright comes
in. By filing with the Library of Congress (and paying them
their required application fee), you can establish definitively
a date of copyright that will stand up in any court of law. Any
judge or jury will defer to your date over someone else who can
merely claim by word of mouth that his text came before yours.
It's a good idea to formally copyright any text that you are
planning to market. So, if you're convinced that the world
population-at-large is in desperate need of "Breeding
Guppies,What Every Ichthyologist Needs to Know" and you plan to
sell it on Ebay for $19.95, you should apply for a formal
copyright. Just having the copyright, however, doesn't mean that
other people can't quote your work. They may do so, as long as
you are given full credit for having written it prior to their
use. This is called a "reference" or a "citation" and generally,
whatever passage is being quoted will appear offset in quotation
marks (so that the reader can visualize which words belong to
someone other than the author of the text in which the quote
appears). Of course, at present the contingent of Copyright
Police is not up to tracking down every single instance of
copyright infringement, and chances are that not everyone cites
original authors as scrupulously as they should, so beware of
whom you casually let look at or read your text (or to whom you
give a copy). Copyrights are not forever. Typically, a copyright
lasts for 50 years past the natural life of the original author.
Authors' heirs may sometimes re-apply for copyrights, but
generally written texts that are this old are considered "public
domain" and may be reproduced without paying the author's family
a royalty fee. In the publishing world, you will find that many
publications require that you relinquish your copyrights to the
work in return for having your work published. This is a fairly
standard procedure—unless your name happens to be Stephen King
or Danielle Steele. Once you've relinquished your copyright to a
given work, you can not sell or submit that text again unless
you get express approval from the publisher that now owns the
copyright. There are sites on the World Wide Web where you can
post your work for others to read or use as they see fit,
so-called "free sites." In cases such as this, there should be a
disclaimer that anyone who uses or reproduces your work must
give you full credit. Whether this happens all the time is
certainly a matter for some speculation, but your safeguard is
that you own the copyright and if you find that someone is
profiting from your work and that you have not been compensated,
you can file a copyright infringement suit against them. As of
the date of this article, the current copyright fee is $30. All
the instructions and necessary forms can be found on U.S.
