|
To protect yourself from someone covering your song for profit you need form PA (a simple chord chart and lyrics will work you don't need a score unless it's complicated work). You can bundle all of your songs as an album and copyright all of them for $30. READ THE INSTRUCTIONS CAREFULLY.
You need a form SR for the recording(s) itself. That way if someone copies the song (or songs) to another CD and tries to sell it you are protected there. Again you can put all of your songs on one CD as an album. Also $30.
It takes almost a year to get your certificate of copyright back from the office. But you are protected as soon as you mail the envelope (actually you are protected the moment you put the song into a recorded medium but that's hard to prove).
If you are trying to copyright a "sound" or "style" forget about it--that won't work. You can't copyright those things. The best you can do is copyright the material (form PA) and the recording (form SR).
Mailing the CD to yourself or a lawyer DOES NOT stand up in court. It's too easy to fake the postage date. If you have to go to court and someone else has copyrighted your material you are out of luck.
|