???? on copyright name

woellerd

Could someone please tell me if it makes a difference which you use for your copyright image. Should you use your business name or personal name.

Examples:
Copyright spiffyneatphotos 2010
or
Copyright John Doe 2010

The above example assumes that you have registered your business as Spiffyneatphotos
Thanks for any advice.

mercphoto

I'd like to add, if anyone can also point a link to a definitive explanation of copyright law that would be much appreciated. I'd love to have PDF or a book about this stuff.

woellerd

Hi Bill, There's a sticky at the top of the mind your business forum on photographers resources that has quite a bit of useful info on law, copyright, and other subjects, but I couldn't find the answer to my specific question. Hopefully someone will provide an answer or link that will help us both __________________
Dave Woeller

Sam

Bill,

Buy a couple of shopping carts loaded with groceries, stock up on fire wood,
Google "Copyright Law", and settle in for the winter.

Sam

Angelo

Dave:

The purpose of copyright is to identify and protect ownership of a creative work and to afford the owner the legal right to defend his work against theft or misuse.

Only a legal entity may take legal action against another party. There are (for the purposes of this discussion) only two types of legal entities - persons and corporations.

A corporation can own copyright to a creative work but says nothing about the original artist.

Unless your business is incorporated there is no further discussion because a DBA would not / can not own copyright nor would you want it to.

If your business is incorporated you still want to copyright under your own name because once you transfer copyright to the corporation you no longer own the work which would be a great loss should the corporation be dissolved.

Art Scott

Angelo wrote:

Dave:

The purpose of copyright is to identify and protect ownership of a creative work and to afford the owner the legal right to defend his work against theft or misuse.

Only a legal entity may take legal action against another party. There are (for the purposes of this discussion) only two types of legal entities - persons and corporations.

A corporation can own copyright to a creative work but says nothing about the original artist.

Unless your business is incorporated there is no further discussion because a DBA would not / can not own copyright nor would you want it to.

If your business is incorporated you still want to copyright under your own name because once you transfer copyright to the corporation you no longer own the work which would be a great loss should the corporation be dissolved.

EXACTLY 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000% CORRECT:D

fredjclaus

This is so true. I would definately copyright under my own name. I am the photographer who took the image, and my business is the "agent" who is selling the image on my behalf. As was stated before a DBA can not own a copyright, as a DBA is just you under a different name.

If you copyright the image under a corporation name, you own it so long as your are the majority stockholder in your corporation. Individuals do NOT own a corporation, stockholders do. You also give up control of the image to whomever you authorize to represent the corporation.

All images are copyrighted by the photographer the moment they are taken, however in order for you to take legal action against a person for copyright infrindgment you need to have filed a copyright with the Library of Congress. There are old ways of copyrighting the image such as mailing a copy to yourself and not opening it, since the postmark could represent the copyright date. This however is not as legal as registering.

takeflightphoto

fredjclaus wrote:

There are old ways of copyrighting the image such as mailing a copy to yourself and not opening it, since the postmark could represent the copyright date.

One of the greatest urban myths of all time. Totally indefensible, then and now.

Believe me, it happened to me as a 20 year old songwriter. Given, it was only a commercial, and not the song of the century, but the Federal court as much as laughed at the whole thing. Initial fees and residuals from the commercial may have paid for college. Registration was available then, as now, but I went the cheap route and sent it to myself.

On the same vein, a (c), date, and your name is only giving notice. Without registration, you'd have a long haul in court proving it.

Always register your intellectual property if you fear being knocked off. You can copy a hard drive's worth of images to a DVD and register the whole thing as a collection. The paperwork, fee, and effort is worth it if you have images worth protecting.

woellerd

Thank you everyone, this is exactly the info I needed.