If you are an inventor, writer, programmer, artist, or filmmaker waiting to bring your original work to the market, this article is for you. Before exposing your invention to this world, ensure to protect it with the right form of protection. Copyright protection help inventors protect their intellectual properties and prevent the properties from being used by other parties without permission. Let’s look at the benefits of registering a copyright for your intellectual assets.
What are Copyrights? Why are they important?
A copyright is an intellectual property protection method that protects the original works of an inventor, such as music, paintings, books, software, movies, etc. In the U.S., as soon as you complete your invention, the legal Ownership of that product automatically becomes yours. However, the protection will become stronger when you legally register a copyright.
You cannot protect intangible works using copyright. For example, a copyright cannot protect a speech or ideas not available in the written or documented format. Once your work is in tangible form, which can be seen, read, or heard by other people, copyrights will be applied to your product. If your property is registered with the U.S. Copyright Office, the copyright protection will be 70 years after the lifetime.
Rights provided by copyright registration
The purpose of registering copyrights for your property doesn’t end with providing protection alone. Copyrights also provide you with certain rights to your invention. With copyrights registered, the owners can publish their work and distribute or make copies.
The owner can produce further derivatives of his work and also display their work. The original creator or the inventor of any product has the right to sell or license the abovementioned rights. However, if anyone tries to perform the above activities without the owner’s permission, copyright law will not permit it.
Advantages of getting a copyright protection
Registering copyright protection for your properties has the following benefits:
- Registered in the U.S.: If you are registering a copyright for your property or invention, it will be stored in the database of the U.S. Copyright Office. People can easily identify that your work is copyrighted since the record is publicly available.
- Restricts unauthorized usage: When your property or invention is copyright protected, no one can illegally use them. Any other organization that tries to duplicate or use your work will come under Copyright Infringement.
- Infringement Lawsuit: If you register copyrights for your work, you will automatically have the right to file a copyright infringement lawsuit when needed. Also, it will provide the validity of your copyright for your work.
- Provides Legal Protection: Once copyright is registered for your work, you will be provided with legal protection for your property. You can use the registration as proof to demonstrate your Ownership.
- Statutory Damages: Once your property is copyrighted, you are authorized to pay statutory damages that range between $750 and $30,000.
- Provides Branding: The copyright registration provides the owner a branding and makes this work recognizable by many people in the world.
- Remuneration and royalty: Whenever the owner’s original work is edited or translated, he has the right to claim royalty or remuneration over the translation.
- Provides Copyright Licensing Right to the Owner: The copyright owner can provide licensing to others. The agreement between the licensee and the licenser clearly states that the original work belongs to the licensor.
- To Produce Sequels: When your product is copyright registered, you will be the only person with the right to produce sequels or further developments of your original work.
- Transferring Ownership: The owner of the copyrighted property has the right to transfer his Ownership temporarily or permanently to someone else.
- Date of Publication: Whenever a copyright is registered, we can easily know the publication date. While dealing with infringement, the date of publication of work is an important factor.
- Legal Ownership for the lifetime: As mentioned above, the owner has legal Ownership of the copyrighted property for the entire duration of his life plus additional 70 years. Because of this, you can safely let your heirs use or work on your properties or inventions without fear of unauthorized usage.
- Benefits in Business: Besides providing benefits to individual artists and inventors, registering copyrights also benefits businesses. Using copyrights, businesses can protect their company websites, software, names, logos, graphics, etc… Also, copyright protection helps when business firms plan to expand their availability internationally.
To sum up
You can now understand the benefits of copyright protection from the above-listed points. It is said that registration is not required for copyright once you have completed your product creation. However, registering a copyright is essential if you want your property protected from infringement by other organizations and enjoy the benefits mentioned.
