Hello, Lets say somebody is getting ready to launch a video-sharing website, that has a nice niche (hasn't been done before) and has a ton of potential. Lets say you have the domain name in place, a company name, logo, etc. What are the proper steps to take to get this website 100% legitimate as for as legalities go? - Logo, does it need to be trademarked? - Name, does it need to be trademarked, registered? - Does the company itself need to be registered? I have been told to go to legalzoom.com. Any advice, or suggestions? Also, what can I expect to pay $$ to get this all squared away?
If you have full confidence that it will go a long way then i would suggest Trademarking the logo and your slogan as those are the ones which matter. Trademarking is much more beneficial as it covers the parody versions of your domain, company etc. to a limit. These all legal stuff usually come into play when you are a nearly established player in the market. These are not usually required for a new player unless your idea is some mind blasting which has never ever been tried on before. Also, just trademarking or patent in one-country doesnt safe-guard you. As some countries like Iran etc have different copyright laws and anyone can open a same company with similar domain and use it. So you are looking at some huge attorney bills if you want to secure all your things.
Ok. Thanks for the detailed and helpful reply, nextgenhost. I guess we will just launch the website and we will see what happens. Im currently waiting on our host to install some server side modules. Anyways - a big question is in regards to a Federal Tax ID #. Do we even need to worry about that if we are not selling products? I know for Ad-Sense it requres a Federal Tax ID # if I am not mistaken.
Depends on the money you want to spend and the confidence of your idea's. If you have a budget that allows it contact a lawyer and get all of your grounds covered. Else, test drive your idea and if you find yourself swamped with traffic then contact a lawyer.
It is not required to create any sort of business entity (LLC, S-Corp, etc.). You can just run the website yourself as a "sole-proprietorship" and pay taxes on a Schedule C. If this is the case, you will use your own personal social security number as your tax ID for AdSense and anything else that requires it.