3 Benefits of Registering A Website with the Copyright Office

Pretty self-explanatory by the title: you're going to get the top three benefits of registering your website with the Copyright Office. Let's go!

If you'd rather watch/listen instead of read, see below!

Benefit of Registering A Website with the Copyright Office #1: Presumptions. 

Now, before your eyes glaze over, let me give you a little explanation of what a presumption is.

Think of a presumption as an assumption. So, what things would you prefer to be assumed in a copyright infringement lawsuit?

Well, if you register the website with the Copyright Office, the presumption is that you are the owner, and that everything in that registration is valid. So, let me put it a little bit differently.

You don't want to have to prove that you're the owner, and you don't want to have to prove that everything about the copyright registration is valid, right? That the information in that application is valid.

Instead of you having to prove that you own it, the other side will have to prove that you DON'T own it. Got it?

So it helps to have those presumptions in your favor.

Benefit #2: Potential to recover statutory damages.

Statutory damages are something in the U.S. Copyright Act that say you get between $750 and $30,000 per infringed work.

So if your website's infringed, and this goes to court, you are automatically entitled to damages inbetween that range.

Yes, it's a big range, and it can depend on the judge you get, but if you can prove WILLFUL infringement, that number bumps up to $150,000.

You might be thinking "$750 on the low end doesn't sound like much." Well if you don't have your work registered with the Copyright Office on time, then you are limited to what's called "actual damages," and that's usually the other side's profits. Well, they might not have any profits to show from the infringement. So then you really aren't entitled to much.

So between $750 and $30,000 sounds pretty good.

Benefit #3: Potential to recover your attorneys' fees if it goes to court.

Let's say you don't ever want to go to court. Ok, you start with a cease-and-desist letter.

Well, if you're on the receiving end of a cease-and-desist letter, and you know that if this does go to court you're going to have to pay the other side's attorneys fees, you're going to want to settle real quick, right?

By having in your letter that you own a registered copyright, that adds a little extra boost to your letter, right? Because they don't want to be on the hook for your attorneys' fees, so they don't want to go to litigation because that's a lot of attorney time. They're more likely to say "let's just settle this now so we don't have to pay attorneys' fees."

So there you go. You've got your presumptions, you've got your statutory damages, and you've got attorneys' fees.

Three good reasons to register your website with the Copyright Office.

Enjoy those three little remedies. And I hope this helped you to understand the three major benefits of registering a website with the Copyright Office.