Hello, I am a composer and I would like to put some of my stuff out for public listening... but I fear that maybe someone would steal my music (not that I'm full of myself... I just worked hard on my music...). If anyone could tell me how to get some of my works copyrighted that would be great and also somewhere to post my music so that I can be heard. Thank you so much

I'm going to move this shortly, but I'll post what I know. I don't know how international copyright law works, but in the US, copyrights work differently than trademarks or patents, as anything you create is already copyrighted to the extent that you are able to demonstrate that you created the work prior to anyone else. This is viable in court, and anywhere else. Art is always copyrighted to the creator, although specific words or phrases can be trademarked, which requires registration, and concepts and technical innovations can be patented.

Unless your employer states otherwise. That's why Disney owns the rights to The Nightmare Before Christmas. (and any other ideas Tim Burton developed while employed there).

Fortunately, he's a big name...so they let him make the film.

as previously mentionned it mainly depends on where you live and how bastardly your employer is. most of the time the intellectual property clause only applies to something directly related to your position of employment (which in the case of roivas' example of tim burton working as an animator with disney doesn't seem that out of the ordinary). other employers would have an unrelated IP clause and lay legal claim to anything you create regardless of your position of employment (like my old bosses who would have owned any piece of music i created while i worked as a software developer)

another thing that people used to do in order to prove ownership of copyright was to mail themselves a copy of their creation. in the case of a piece of music i'd simply burn off a cd copy and pack it with any other tangible material you have with it (sheet music / lyrics / etc.). just mail yourself a copy and keep the envelope sealed once you receive it. the postmark on the envelope 'should' hold up in court (if things ever get that serious) as a means of determining a reference point of ownership / creation.

Well, yes, if you sell your rights to someone else, you're screwed. I figured that part was obvious.

I don't think we need to bring up record labels here.

Oh yeah. Just being a know-it-all...nevermind.

i don't think i'd say you were being a now it all hehehe maybe i was just naive but i'd never heard of an intellectual property clause before i had to sign a contract within the 'entertainment' industry. i actually had to talk with my employer twice before he was clear about just what they wanted to own while i worked for them.

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