Hello, When you see a site with something like: © Copyright 2007, BusinessName. HTML: Did they do anything fancy, or did they just write that at the bottom to scare away content thiefs? Should I add that to the bottom of my sites? Do I need to do any legal paperwork first? Thanks.
In the United States, your work is protected by copyright at the moment you create it. You do not need to register your copyright with the government (or do any legal paperwork) for your work to be protected. Registration is optional, and is only necessary if you intend to file a court case against another person for copyright infringement. You also do not need to register a copyright in order to put a copyright statement on your website (or other creative work). Putting a copyright statement on your work (a website in this case) is not required. However, it does make clear who the owner of the copyright is. I would recommend putting a copyright statement on your website. Some people wrongly assume that anything that doesn't have a copyright statement on it is free for the taking! So, including a copyright statement may deter some people from copying your content. It also lets people know who to contact if they would like to ask permission to (legally) reprint your work. The US government has a very good website which explains the ins and outs of US copyright law: www.copyright.gov I also wrote a short article summarizing copyright law for authors here: http://www.emptymirrorbooks.com/publishing/copyright.html (That article is mostly aimed at poets & authors but applies equally to creative work of all kinds, and there's a paragraph or two about website copyrights.) cheers ~ Denise