There are many reasons to copyright your website. Ideas, even though they are yours, don’t stay in one place for long. One day you have a thriving popular website and the next you see a virtual carbon copy taking much of your hard earned business. While a copyright doesn’t necessarily protect you from all copying or infringement it does make suing for outright theft possible. Without the protection of an official copy write your word doesn’t hold much power in court. Below is a step by step process to get your website officially copyrighted by the government.
Copyright and intellectual property right is a complex and morally ambiguous field of study. But while some things, like ideas may be open to interpretation, some things aren’t. Website logo, music, audiovisual material, artwork must not be used with out the copyright holders permission. A copyright does not safeguard systems, procedures, methods of operations, however.
The first thing to do in order in order to copyright your website is to visit the website of the U.S Government Copyright Office (http://www.copyright.gov) and look up the Circular 66 form. This form will explain how to proceed in copyrighting your site and all other necessary action. Attached is an application you are required to sign. To protect your text (i.e your content) you will need to fill out the TX Form. All pictures are copyrighted using the VA Form, and PA for all audiovisual content.
The next step is to submit your Deposit to the Copyright Office. The Deposit is a copy of all the work you wish to be copyrighted. You can burn it all onto a CD-R or print off the website onto a tangible document. You will also need to send in a check with applicable rate (found on the website), with a mandatory filing fee, along with your CD-R or printed out website to the following address.
Send it to:
Library of Congress, Copyright Office
101 Independence Avenue SE
Washington D.C 20559-6000