Music Business 101 - Copyright Registration

"Important! When is the effective date of a copyright registration - the date the Copyright Office receives your application, or the date the Copyright Office completes the registration process for your application? Good question! Unfortunately, courts are split on this question. Some take the first approach, some take the second. With the time-sensitive nature of many of the registration benefits, it’s very important to be aware of which rule the venue you are suing in follows. A good copyright lawyer is highly recommended if you have questions about this."

Here's a question I have about this; If you register a song with the Copyright office but it takes six to eight months for them to process it, should you do business with your song in the meantime or wait it out? I assume that if you did what you were suppose to do correctly that your copyright would go through. So it's fair to say that you will own the copyright. Any thoughts?
 
Your copyright is in effect from "day one" of fixing its form. Registering gives you proof and a few more legal protections in the event of an action, but it does not grant copyright itself; that is a given. So I would think in the case you describe, the best answer would be to both register, and also to have some time-stamped self-held evidence as well (MIDI files, wave file or MP3 with proper notation, chord and lyric sheets postmarked to yourself, etc., etc.). Anything that could establish a date/priority for yourself in the interim while your registration is/was in process...

GJ
 
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