How To Proceed ... Published Songs Without Copyright.

[Ed98]

Hello all,

 

I have a situation that is giving me some concern.  I have a few songs that I've written and performed with my band. Unfortunately, we made the mistake of uploading two of them to my YouTube account, without copyright registration. Now I want to copyright these two songs along with a few others that I also have and that haven't been recorded yet. My concern is whether these two songs are already considered as "published works", since they are available to the public on Youtube. If that's the case, I 'd like to know how to submit them as they're required so send some kind of proof, but all I have is a Youtube link or otherwise, they can still be considered as unpublished works and therefore be submitted along with the other unpublished songs.

 

Any one, please help me on this.

 

Thanks.

Ed98.

[Bernd]

The works are yours and automatically protected by law. By registering them with the LOC you reserve certain legal advantages in the US::

Why should I register my work if copyright protection is automatic?

Registration is recommended for a number of reasons. Many choose to register their works because they wish to have the facts of their copyright on the public record and have a certificate of registration. Registered works may be eligible for statutory damages and attorney's fees in successful litigation. Finally, if registration occurs within 5 years of publication, it is considered prima facie evidence in a court of law. See Circular 1, Copyright Basics, section “Copyright Registration†and Circular 38b, Highlights of Copyright Amendments Contained in the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), on non-U.S. works.

 

=> after publication you have (nearly) 5 years time to do this.

Outside the USA no action is required. Any proof that you were the first to publish the songs under your name will do.

 

For more details see: http://copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-general.html

Edited December 1, 2014 by Bernd

[Ed98]

Thank you Bernd for your answer. So in your opinion, should I proceed to register these two songs as "unpublished works", even though they're available to the public on Youtube up to date?

 

Regards.

Ed98. 

[Bernd]

You'll have to check out their guidelines, I guess ("unpublished" would sound wrong to me, is there no more generic option?).

Fortunately, we Europeans don't have such problems :-)

[Ed98]

Honestly, I'm not sure I'd spend much time worrying about the difference. Here's the reason I say that.....while the registration forms themselves do ask if it's published, or unpublished, that information appears nowhere on our actual certification.

• I checked several of my hard copy registration certificates this morning at home & there is absolutely no mention of it.
• To investigate a bit further, I just pulled up several filings for myself and an old friend. There is no indication of published or unpublished in the online records either. Over the years, I've filed a total of 17 collective works....both through the mail & online.....while using both forms PA and SR.....no difference. Neither version makes any reference to published vs. unpublished filings. I've pasted in an example below from one of my friends' filings.

 

Based on what I've just said, in the event you had to produce these records to prove ownership, how would they even know which way you filed? 

 

Aside from that, if you're still concerned about covering yourself beyond the shadow of a doubt, why not file everything as "Published" and be done with it? If you're only concern is being 100% honest, upload the remaining songs to a free site somewhere & delete them after a few minutes. Technically speaking, I guess that would make them published works.....right?

 

Good luck and happy holidays!

 

Tom 

Hello Tom,

 

Thank you so much for taking the time to investigate much deeper into this.  I like pretty much your suggestion of uploading the remaining songs so that all of them are considered as published, but this action raises a few more doubts / questions. I hope you can help me on this, so that I can finally finish this process. Here they are:

 

1) The PA Form requests at least two complete copies for "published works", how am I supposed to do that? These songs have  been / will be loaded to a website for streaming... I'm not sure how to do this.

2) Which publication date will actually be taken into account, Is it the date when I uploaded the first song?  Not sure either, these songs have been "published" in different years.

 

Again, thank you so much for your help.

 

Regards,

Ed98.

[MikeRobinson]

I suggest that you file the copyright registration online, and that you simply give what you consider to be the most-truthful answer with regards to "publication" status.  If you decide that some of the songs were "published" via YouTube and the others were not, submit two separate registrations, one for each collection of songs.

 

I hope that you had the presence-of-mind to put some kind of copyright-notice into the YouTube posting.  If not, you should promptly take-down the videos and replace them with copies that do.  Make it explicitly clear that someone does claim legal ownership of the material, explicitly following the notification requirements set forth in the law.  That way, no one can reasonably make an "innocent infringement" defense.

 

Always-and-forever in the future, be sure to submit your copyright registrations at least one full day before you post anything to any online site, thereby removing all doubt that it was, at the time of registration, "unpublished" material.  Carefully but unobtrusively include the required notices.  (It's also appropriate to include the notices in the metadata-tags of the MP3, along with the song's title and the band's/author's name.)  Assert your claim, in such a way that no one could credibly persuade a judge that "gee, I didn't know."