When you create something on your own, you own the copyright. Period. You do NOT need to register your poem, novel, essay, etc. with the U.S. Copyright Office or any other agency. According to the Copyright Office, “Copyright is secured automatically when the work is created, and a work is 'created' when it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord for the first time.” (U.S. Copyright Office, Copyright Basics, “How to secure a copyright,” July, 2006.) There are some reasons why you may want to register your created work with the Copyright Office, and I’ll go into them in a later post.
If you write something for someone or something else, you will need to ask what rules apply. For example, I wrote an essay on teaching that was published in the Winter 2007 edition of Wisconsin People & Ideas. Once I created it, I owned the copyright, BUT once they accepted it for publication, we mutually agreed that they had first rights to publish the essay, and then the copyright reverted to me. When something you have created is accepted for publication (and this includes online publications), then you need to be aware of how that changes your rights—if it does. For my article published in the March edition of the online magazine, Victoriana, I retained all my rights throughout the process.
When I worked for insurance and hospital corporations, anything I wrote as part of my job or my consulting contract belonged to the company—not to me. Again, you need to clarify this with your employer or client.
If you write something for someone or something else, you will need to ask what rules apply. For example, I wrote an essay on teaching that was published in the Winter 2007 edition of Wisconsin People & Ideas. Once I created it, I owned the copyright, BUT once they accepted it for publication, we mutually agreed that they had first rights to publish the essay, and then the copyright reverted to me. When something you have created is accepted for publication (and this includes online publications), then you need to be aware of how that changes your rights—if it does. For my article published in the March edition of the online magazine, Victoriana, I retained all my rights throughout the process.
When I worked for insurance and hospital corporations, anything I wrote as part of my job or my consulting contract belonged to the company—not to me. Again, you need to clarify this with your employer or client.
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