There is a popular myth that the best way to protect your copyright is to send yourself a copy of the work in an envelope and that you will be protected as long as you do not open the envelope. Unfortunately, courts are often not swayed by this evidence due to its ease of manipulation. There are better ways to prove that you are the original creator of a work.

One of the best ways is to register your copyright in the United States. Surprisingly, having a US registration can be helpful in disputes here in the UK. Many times, the creator of a work will need to provide evidence that they are the creator and the date the creation was created.

One of the main differences between English and American copyright law is that the United States still has a copyright registration system, while England abandoned it long ago. The United States (along with most EU countries) is a signatory to the Berne Convention. Countries signatories to this convention agree to recognize each other’s copyrights and try to harmonize their laws as much as possible. Although the Convention began in 1886, it did not enter into force in the US until 1989, primarily because of a provision calling for the abolition of the copyright registration requirement. This meant that you did not have any copyright protection unless you had formally registered the work with the national office. The United States has slightly changed its laws to comply with the convention, but has managed to maintain the registration requirement. The United States has several good reasons for wanting to maintain the registration requirement. One of the main reasons is to build a national library. Even now, part of the registration requirement includes depositing a copy of our work with the Library of Congress, which has been around since 1800 and is the world’s largest library by shelf space and number of books.

A US copyright registration can be invaluable if you ever need to enforce your copyright in the US. In fact, if you are a US citizen, you will not be able to sue without a copyright registration. Copyright registration can also be critical, even if you are located outside of the US. Without it, you are limited to only actual damages which can be difficult to prove and quite low. With copyright registration, you are entitled to legal damages and attorneys’ fees (not normally awarded under US law), which are generally larger amounts and easier to prove than the damages and damages.

Simply having a record can be helpful, especially since the offender knows that they will have to pay legal fees for both.

In our experience, we have also found that having a copyright can help during web-based infringement and hosts and ISPs are often more likely to honor a takedown notice that cites a registered copyright.

However, there are several important things to keep in mind when registering a work for US copyright. You may encounter difficulties if you are disallowed for a copyright and then need to use or enforce it in the US. later. You should also keep in mind that when you register a copyright, your work becomes public. This can have major consequences, especially for software that has code that most copyright holders would not want made public.