Completing a book is always a great achievement, often representing months or years of hard work and dedication.
This is true whether you are a first author or a veteran with dozens of books in the field. This is true whether it’s a vanity press, a mainstream publisher, or a free download.
Simple Stages
Regardless of the type of book, how it’s published, or who it serves, it’s worth taking some time to decide how to copyright a book and protect your book as much as possible. Because even if you intend to distribute a book for free, the book is worthwhile and worth protecting. In particular, it is cheap and easy to copyright a book.
To do so, here are 5 simple stages to copyright a book before sending it out to the public.
Register to copyright a book
This is one of the most obvious but also one of the most overlooked steps to copyright a book. If you are in the United States, the creation of your work is automatically copyrighted, but you need to register to sue for infringement of your work copyright a book. Also, if you want full compensation for your work, you need to register in time to copyright a book.
Technically, registration should consider in good time within three months of publication, but once the book is complete, there are not many reasons to be late. The only caveat is that if you want to print a book in physical format, you must submit two physical copies of the work, not digital copies. But if you only have eBooks, you don’t need to wait.
If you go through a traditional publisher, the publisher may process your registration, causing this problem. In this case, though, ask your broker or editor so that you can copyright a book.
If you have to do it yourself, registering a book with the US Copyright Office costs $35 (at the time of writing) and can do quickly and easily on their website to copyright a book. However, if you need extra support, there are services that can handle most of your work, you can also hire the best website for writers.
In short, register your copyright as soon as possible. It’s cheap, easy, and provides important protection for your job.
Consider the license
Registering your copyright is a common task that all authors should seriously consider since your license is more or less not an option at all. This is because a license is selected for you even if you don’t choose a license for your work: all rights reserved.
Think about how you want others to use your content. Are you comfortable with others sharing your work as long as they provide attribution? What if they do it for profit? If so, it’s best to look at Creative Commons and consider using a license that publicly allows such use.
Even if this doesn’t suit your interests, it’s a good idea to include a way to contact you if someone else wants to republish all or part of the book. This can do on email, website, and/or address.
But the main thing is to be clear on what your desire is, whether all rights reserve, or a more open nature, and content in a way that is not expressly permitted. It’s about making it available to those who want to.
Draft copyright notice
Copyright notices are not really required by law. Copyright can grant when work creates. That said, it’s probably still a good idea, just because some people misunderstand the notification.
Writing a copyright notice is very easy. If you’re working with a publisher, the publisher may have stock text you’d like to use, but if not, you’ll need to find a good sample book rights page that you can get from.
Still, a basic copyright notice is enough (and more than required by law), but if you write thousands of words in a book, it can take seconds to create a simple claim to prevent abuse. It makes sense to get that content.
Set up monitoring
When your book is released, you’ll know where it’s online, what people are saying about it, and whether it’s offering illegal downloads.
To do this, create a Google Alert in the title of the book before publication. For common book titles, consider adding your name to the query to display only the book’s edition. Also, consider creating similar alerts for unique passages in your book so that it detects everywhere, including your book’s text.
It is very important to do when you publish the book. Unlike copyright registration, this is a step you can and should take, even if you go through a traditional publisher. You may not have dealt with copyright enforcement issues, but you can warn your publisher about the issues you’re having.
Anyhow, it is very important to set it up before publishing. Probably because the book attracted a lot of attention shortly after it publishes, if you start a search a few weeks after the item publishes, most of it will probably come up behind you.
Plan Execution Strategies
Finally, after all, it’s time to think about when and what you should do if you find out that your work is breaking the rules. What kind of infringement are you targeting?
When things do happen, it can be very helpful to take a moment to consider your goals and desires regarding infringement.
This means planning to handle the situation before facing the first breach, making it easier and faster to respond. It also helps reduce the emotional load.
Again, if you work with publishers, this is another area where publishers may take the lead. However, they may be willing to involve you in law enforcement or at least have some input on it.
Still, whether you’re alone or with a publisher, you need to think about your law enforcement efforts before publishing, especially what you want and your strategy for achieving it.
Conclusion
Today we discussed 5 simple stages to copyright a book. After all, if you spend time and effort writing a book, it makes sense to spend a little time and effort protecting it. This includes piracy, plagiarism, and other threats that could affect it.
If you go alone, you are solely responsible for this protection. It is your responsibility to follow the steps above and ensure that your books have all available protections.
If you work with a publisher, we have partners in those efforts.
However, you can only be an effective partner if you involve actively. If you don’t consider book rights, you can’t ask questions or take the necessary steps to ensure your book is protected.
Overall, it’s your job and like your kids. If you protect it well, it will continue to serve you and possibly generate income for years to come.
