Registered mail cant protect copyright

[MalikZiplock]

Hey Everyone
I did some research and found out that lots of artists register their work with the post office. They call it the poor mans way, but I found out that the post offices only keeps record of a work sent in their registered mail archives from 1-9 years, depending on the service provider you use. Well copyright exists for “50 years past the death of the last standing author” in Canada and 70 years in the USA. Also the copyright office told me that the post office doesn’t collect enough substantial data, which would satisfies the requirements of the courts. So in fact the post office doesn’t work.
The other way is with the Copyright office. Unfortunately it’s quite pricey!
Does anyone know of any other methods
Malik

[Big-Dave]

Actually the reason the post office thing was supposed to work was it meant you had an original of the work with an officially dated envelope. Like you said, though, it doesn't work. Probably because there's ways to open envelopes and reseal them.

As far as I know, thee aren't any ways to register copyright officially other than through the patents office. Like you said, it's kinda pricey, but if you put a collection of works through them it reduces the price a bit (you could copy, say, 10 paintings as a collection. Although it would be the collection that was copyright, as opposed to individual works, anyone copying one of the ieces would be copying a part of the collection, which is still infringement of copyright)

[egerie]

Why do I have this déjà-vu feeling ?...