copy write advice

[Luke]

Like sugarplums, I sometimes have visions of grandeur dancing in my head. I am just looking for a little free advice, realizing of course the value of such items.

I now have a multitude of recorded songs. In a way I suppose this is a mid-life crisis. I am debating with myself about attempting to send them somewhere for professional opinions. Ms. Luke has told on several occasions I should seek professional help, but I think she has something else in mind.

As much as I enjoy performing, I would be happy at this stage of life too leave some of my "work" behind.

For several years my friends would receive a CD of songs along with accompanying CD art in a parody of professional music CD.

On all my CD's I have listed Infant Records as the publishing company.

Now that the rambling is over here are the questions.

1. Should I spend the money to copy write my songs?

2. Even though Infant Records is a figment of my imagination should I include on the demo?

[Phil Fiord]

Go make a LLC under that label name. New Hampshire is pretty friendly there.

Make your CD's yourself or find a maker to make pro copies and inserts.

Vanity profits.

[American Patriot]

Luke.... Phil is right there, and I suspect he knows more about this than either you or I put together. I know he used to work in some related business

In the mean time, two important things about "Copyright"

There are specific laws about copyrights that you can look up for free on the internet and you SHOULD do this first.

Second, there are several ways to "copyright" material you've produced. The first, most important thing is that as soon as you put words to paper (or perhaps in this case to disk), regardless of written, sung or chiseled out - it IS "copyrighted" -- its yours. PROVING IT is something different. There is a "poorman's copyright" protection which can and has held up in a court of law, then there's the "legal through a lawyer, send copies to the copyright offices" way.

The cheap way is to put everything in an envelop, and mail it to yourself. Don't OPEN it when it gets back, just stick the whole thing in a safe deposit box somewhere. Then you just leave it there for, like, you know, forever... until someone "steals something" of yours and you need to take them to court. Then you can contact a lawyer and give him the stuff. It can be opened in court in front of a notary etc. This is certainly NOT the BEST way to do ANYTHING.

The second way, is as Phil said, set up an LLC. That's cheap and easy in 90% of the states. Then you do something similar as above, but you make SURE everything is notarized, legalized by signatures of some witnesses, etc (or a lawyer) and then you file copies with the Copyright office. There are specific requirements for them and I don't remember them all... so, spend some time googling cuz the stuff is out there.

[Phil Fiord]

As to the LLC, Legalzoom.com should be a cheap way to do this. It is self done, using their forms and is not a law office. It is a site designed to help do common legal paperwork for a fee, of course, but it is a lot cheaper than an attorney for the same common service.

[Luke]

Thanks for the advice guys. It is even beyond my wildest dreams that anyone would "steal" my songs, in fact I would consider it a compliment at this stage of life.

It used to cost around $15 per song to have a copywrite applied. So a 10 song CD would run around $150. I am somewhat interested in the LLC idea for Infant Records however.

I will investigate Legalzoom for sure.

[American Patriot]

If you're not worried about stealing... then just make the cds and sell 'em!

lol

You can also publish through iTunes, I THINK. (I think its like amazon and kindle, you can write a book and publish an e-copy to sell to folks).

[wallis]

I have several books copyrighted and registered in the Library of Congress.Just for you, though, I have found a source on how to do the same with music: http://www.wikihow.com/Copyright-a-Song

The "insert link" isn't working, so please copy the above line into your address line.

[American Patriot]

Wallis, the link is working. The system generally converts it if you just type it in, or copy/paste it.

[Luke]

Thanks friends.

[Phil Fiord]

Good luck Mr Luke in your venture.

[Backstop]

Yeah - best of luck Luke.