There is good information, and some, not so good information posted above.
Here is what I have learned about copyright laws over the last 25 years of writing.
1. A poor man’s copyright is not worth the price of the stamp you put on it
to mail it to yourself. It has been proven, in court, not to hold up as legal
proof of ownership. Sending it REGISTERED MAIL doesn’t make it legal
proof either.
2. Registering a COLLECTION of songs with the U.S. copyright office is also worthless.
The only thing that you are registering is the Collection itself, not the individual
song titles. Think about it for a moment. I can register a Collection of the following
songs:
1. Happy Birthday To You
2. The Lighthouse
3. Three Blind Mice
4. Midnight Train To Georgia
5. We Shall Behold Him
If I register this collection of songs, I can call it “Random Songs I Put Together”.
The only thing that I have protected is this TITLE of this collection. I would now
own the right to place those five songs together in a printed or recorded form.
If anyone else wanted to put those same five titles together, then they would
have to have my legal permission to do so.
Registering a Collection of songs is best used by print publishers and record companies.
For instance, when a new Hymnal is published, the publishing company will register that
collection of titles under one title, which is the name of the Hymnal. The same holds true for
sound recordings. A record company will register the song titles of an artist project, by the
project title. This prevents someone else from duplicating the exact collection.
Just because I register this COLLECTION, it does not mean that I have any proof
or legal ownership of the INDIVIDUAL songs in that collection. Even if you did write every song
in your collection, registering the Collection will not be PROOF that you wrote the Individual songs in
the collection.
I’ve never met a beginning writer yet that wasn’t looking for a short cut around the system.
But doing it right, is still the best way to do it. Here are the facts.
1. Your song has legal Copyright protection from the moment of it’s creation.
2. You should always include your copyright information on any COPY you make of the song, in
print or recorded form. That is legal Copyright notification.
3. If your songs are being released into the market place for publication or recording, then they should
be registered with your performing rights organization, (ie) BMI, ASCAP, or SESAC.
4. Since registration is so expensive with the Library of Congress Copyright Office, most publishing
companies don’t register an individual song, until it has been recorded by a label artist, or used in
a major print publication.
I hope this information helps.
