Copyright

[Christy]

How would I go about getting something copyrighted? I want to make a website publishing some original stories of mine

[}:8) Supermoo]

If you live in say America, It's instant American copyright. To make it international you only need a notice in the following format;


&copy: Copyright 2001 Me

This gives you international copyright, although you cannot copyright names, ideas or fact. Just be warned. :)

[Canuckkev]

Doing it Supermoo's method does make you the official copyright owner, but you can not sue someone unless you have the official copyright. BUT, you can sue someone for infringement even after the infringement, once you get a registered copyright. Check out http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html for more info. The link to the United States copyright Office is http://www.loc.gov/copyright/

[Victoria7]

ACAP's q&a board is a good place to ask these questions, plus you can see the old questions and answers. The site is at http://welcome.to/acap/.

If you're a US citizen, a work is copyrighted the moment it is fixed in a tangible form - and that includes a CD or a computer file. Of course, you can't copyright names, ideas, or titles (but you can trademark the titles and names, I think :).

Just put a little notice at the bottom (or top!) of your page stating:

© Copyright 0000 Your Name
All rights reserved.

And add a little text to let people know they can't copy your stories.

It's tricky ground, particularly on the Internet, where anyone could technically take your stories and put them on their own page if they wanted to. But here's a tip: if you want to regularly check on whether or not your stories have been posted elsewhere on the Internet, go to http://www.google.com and type in some distinctive parts of your story; say, the names of two characters.