The Copyright Office is Going Electronic - Finally! - with ECo

The U.S. Copyright Office has announced the implementation of ECo - Electronic Copyright Office. You can now use the ECo online system to register or pre-register your work.

Certain conditions must be met for pre-registration:

1. the work must be unpublished;
   
2. the work must be in the process of being prepared for commercial distribution in either physical or digital format, e.g., film copies, CDs, computer programs to be sold online
   
3. the work must be a type of work determined by the Register to have had a history of infringement prior to authorized commercial distribution. The works determined to be eligible under this requirement are:
   

   * motion pictures * sound recordings * musical compositions * literary works being prepared for publication in book form * computer programs (including video games) * advertising or marketing photographs

   
   

   Note that pre-registration is not the same as registration. The Copyright Office says most works don't need to be pre-registered, nor is it useful, because the work must still be registered. It sounds like the condition of "history of infringment" is the one you should look at if you want to pre-register.

   I am happy that artists/writers can now register online. Have you registered any copyrights? I would be interested in your experiences - use the forum to talk about the experience.