Copyright registration

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The purpose of copyright registration is to place on record a verifiable account of the date and content of the work in question, so that in the event of a legal claim, or case of infringement

Copyright infringement is the unauthorized or prohibited use of works under copyright, infringing the copyright holder's exclusive rights, such as the right to reproduce or perform the copyrighted work, or to make derivative works.- "Piracy" :...

or plagiarism

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...

, the copyright

Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...

owner can produce a copy of the work from an official government source.

Before 1978, in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, federal copyright was generally secured by the act of publication with notice of copyright or by registration of an unpublished work. This has now been largely superseded by international conventions, principally the Berne Convention

Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works

The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, is an international agreement governing copyright, which was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland in 1886.- Content :...

, which provide rights harmonized at an international level without a requirement for national registration. However, the U.S. still provides legal advantages for registering works of U.S. origin.

Is registration required?

It is a common misconception to confuse copyright registration with the granting of copyright.

Copyright is itself an automatic international right, governed by international conventions - principally the Berne Convention (which dates from 1886

1886 in music

- Events :*March 21 - Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 is performed for the first time publicly in Vienna, conducted by Hans Richter. This is his breakthrough work....

). This means that copyright exists whether a work is registered or not. When the US signed up to the Convention in 1989

1989 in music

This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1989.-Events:*January 14 – Paul McCartney releases Снова в СССР exclusively in the USSR...

, the internal registration system was retained, but foreign works must now be treated as though already registered in the US in accordance with the Berne Convention.

Professor Lawrence Lessig

Lawrence Lessig

Lawrence "Larry" Lessig is an American academic and political activist. He is best known as a proponent of reduced legal restrictions on copyright, trademark, and radio frequency spectrum, particularly in technology applications, and he has called for state-based activism to promote substantive...

, Representative Lofgren

Zoe Lofgren

Zoe Lofgren is the U.S. Representative for , serving since 1995. She is a member of the Democratic Party. The district is based in San Jose.-Early life, education, and early career:...

and others have suggested that countries impose registration requirements after the internal term of protection required by the Berne Convention.

Where can work be registered?

In Kenya, copyrighted works can be registered at the Kenya Copyrights Board for a small fee.

In the United Kingdom, commercial services provide a registration facility where copies of work can be lodged to establish legal evidence of a copyright claim. In the UK, there are also requirements to file certain published works with the British Library
British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom, and is the world's largest library in terms of total number of items. The library is a major research library, holding over 150 million items from every country in the world, in virtually all known languages and in many formats,...

and, on request, the five legal deposit libraries
National library
A national library is a library specifically established by the government of a country to serve as the preeminent repository of information for that country. Unlike public libraries, these rarely allow citizens to borrow books...

.

In the United States, the United States Copyright Office
United States Copyright Office
The United States Copyright Office, a part of the Library of Congress, is the official U.S. government body that maintains records of copyright registration in the United States. It is used by copyright title searchers who are attempting to clear a chain of title for copyrighted works.The head of...

accepts registrations. For works created in the US by US citizens, a registration is also required before an infringement suit may be filed in a US court. Furthermore, copyright holders cannot claim statutory damages
Statutory damages for copyright infringement
Statutory damages for copyright infringement are available under some countries' copyright laws.The charges allow copyright holders, who succeed with claims of infringement, to receive an amount of compensation per work...

or attorney's fee
Attorney's fee
Attorney's fee is a chiefly United States term for compensation for legal services performed by an attorney for a client, in or out of court. It may be an hourly, flat-rate or contingent fee. Attorney fees are separate from fines, compensatory and punitive damages, and from court costs in a...

s unless the work was registered prior to infringement, or within three months of publication.

Finding copyright registrations

All United States copyright registrations and renewals registered since 1978 have been published online at the
Copyright Office website. Registrations and renewals prior to 1978

were published in semi-annual softcover Copyright Catalog

United States copyright registrations, renewals and other catalog entries since 1978 are published online at the. Entries prior to 1978 are not published in the Online Catalog....

s. For films from 1894 to 1969, inclusive, Library of Congress

Library of Congress

The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...

published hardcover Cumulative Copyright Catalogs, each covering ten or more years.

Please see the Copyright Catalog

United States copyright registrations, renewals and other catalog entries since 1978 are published online at the. Entries prior to 1978 are not published in the Online Catalog....

article for links to download digital copies of these pre-1978 US catalogs.

Requirements by country

Copyright Registration by Country
Country	Registration Agency (if any)	Copyright registration requirements
Albania Albania Albania , officially known as the Republic of Albania , is a country in Southeastern Europe, in the Balkans region. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea...	Albanian Author’s Right Office	Voluntary. Registration is acceptable in court as evidence of author's right.
Antigua and Barbuda Antigua and Barbuda Antigua and Barbuda is a twin-island nation lying between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It consists of two major inhabited islands, Antigua and Barbuda, and a number of smaller islands...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
Argentina Argentina Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...	Ministry of Justice, Security, and Human Rights	Voluntary. Registration serves as presumption of authorship and date of creation.
Australia Australia Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
Brazil Brazil Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...	Various, depending on subject matter	Voluntary. Registration may help to provide evidence of authorship and which may aid in certifying precedence in the case of two similar works.
Canada Canada Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...	Canadian Intellectual Property Office Canadian Intellectual Property Office The Canadian Intellectual Property Office is the patent, trademark, and copyright administration body of Canada. Structurally the CIPO functions as a Special Operating Agency which is associated with Industry Canada....	Voluntary. Registration is evidence of ownership in an infringement case.
China China Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...	National Copyright Administration	Voluntary. Recommended, especially for software.
Denmark Denmark Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
Egypt Egypt Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
France France The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...	Office of Literacy and Artistic Property	Voluntary, may establish evidence of date of creation and a presumption of ownership.
Germany Germany Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
India India India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...	Copyright Office	Voluntary, establishes prima facie evidence of the facts contained on the registration certificate and may be used in court as proof of those facts.
Israel Israel The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
Jamaica Jamaica Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...	None - The Intellectual Property Services Centre is a non-profit organization that provides private registration services and is recommended by the Jamaican Intellectual Property Office for that purpose	Not officially available, though voluntary registration through the Intellectual Property Services Centre provides rebuttable evidence of authorship and/or ownership. The Jamaican Intellectual Property Office officially recommends the practice of "poor man's copyright Poor man's copyright Poor man's copyright is a method of using registered dating by the postal service, a notary public or other highly trusted source to date intellectual property, thereby helping to establish that the material has been in one's possession since a particular time... " to provide evidence of ownership and creation date.
Japan Japan Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...	Agency for Cultural Affairs Agency for Cultural Affairs The is a special body of the Japanese Ministry of Education . It was set up in 1968 to promote Japanese arts and culture. As of April 2007, it is led by the Commissioner for Cultural Affairs, Tamotsu Aoki....	Voluntary, establishes presumption of facts contained in registration for use in court.
Kenya Kenya Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...	Kenya Copyright Board	Voluntary, establishes prima facie evidence of the facts contained on the registration certificate and may be used in court as proof of those facts
Lithuania Lithuania Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
Mexico Mexico The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...	National Copyrights Institute	Voluntary, establishes prima facie evidence of ownership.
Russian Federation	Rospatent	Voluntary registration available for computer programs and databases.
Spain Spain Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...	Ministry of Culture	Voluntary, offers refutable presumption of copyright and ownership, but not required to file suit for infringement.
Sweden Sweden Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
Turkey Turkey Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...	Ministry of Culture	Required for cinematographic works and phonograms, voluntary for all other works. Registration may be used as evidence.
Ukraine Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...	National Office of Intellectual Property	Voluntary.
United Kingdom United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...	None	Not required. No voluntary procedure available.
United States of America	United States Copyright Office United States Copyright Office The United States Copyright Office, a part of the Library of Congress, is the official U.S. government body that maintains records of copyright registration in the United States. It is used by copyright title searchers who are attempting to clear a chain of title for copyrighted works.The head of...	Not required to obtain copyright protection, but required for domestic copyright owners to bring a suit for copyright infringement in federal court. Not required for a federal court's subject-matter jurisdiction Subject-matter jurisdiction Subject-matter jurisdiction is the authority of a court to hear cases of a particular type or cases relating to a specific subject matter. For instance, bankruptcy court only has the authority to hear bankruptcy cases.... , however, as established through the Supreme Court decision in Reed Elsevier, Inc. v. Muchnick. Registration establishes prima facie evidence of facts contained in registration certificate if made within five years of first publication. Copyright owners are precluded from collecting statutory damages and/or attorney's fees for any infringement occurring before registration. Foreign copyright owners are not required to register before suing for copyright infringement, but at least one court has held that they are subject to the same preclusion of statutory damages as domestic authors.

External links

World Intellectual Property Organization - Directory of Intellectual Property Offices