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Timely copyright registration of a work provides the copyright holder with a number of legal advantages. The copyright itself is not created by the registation — indeed, the copyright exists as soon as you write an article or snap a photograph — but registration provides a number of benefits.
A copyright registration can establish an author’s ownership of a certain work and the date of creation. A common but false myth is that mailing a self-addressed package containing a work can be used to prove ownership and the date of creation. This “poor man’s copyright” is no substitute for a proper registration.
If someone infringes your work, a timely copyright registration is truly invaluable. A timely registration provides you with a number of powerful tools should you need to go to court. The first is statutory damages, a unique form of compensation that can be awarded to a copyright holder even in the absence of proof that the infringement caused monetary damage to the copyright holder or that the infringer profited from the infringement. Not infrequently, a meritorious lawsuit is a paper tiger because neither damages nor profits can be proven – and in these cases statutory damages can save the day.
The second powerful tool copyright registration provides a copyright holder is entitlement to attorneys’ fees from the infringer. There is only one thing infringers hate more than paying their attorneys’ bills – paying someone else’s attorneys’ bills. This prospect provides ample incentive to settle quickly.
In order to enjoy these benefits of registration, however, it must be timely, which means that the work must be registered either before the infringement commences or within a three month window after the article is first published.