Copyright Protection 03/24/12

        I have finally found a document about the copyright protection in the US at the website of United States Copyright Office, while I was trying to make my own authorship of couple of songs that I made. This document not only showed me more about how can one become the owner of the intellectual property, but also specific intellectual properties that are protected under the law of the copyright.
        According to the United States Copyright Office, for example, copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S.Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works. Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act generally gives the owner of copyright the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:
• reproduce the work in copies or phonorecords
• prepare derivative works based upon the work
• distribute copies or phonorecords of the work to the public by sale or other
transfer of ownership, or b  y rental, lease, or lending
• perform the work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audio­
visual works
• display the work publicly, in   the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural
works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other
audiovisual work
• perform the work publicly (in the case of sound recordings*) by means of
a digital audio transmission

The document not only talks about the copyright in great detail, but also goes through how does the intellectual property start as one's property and how and what is protection under the copyright. This was a great information to obtain as my Senior Honors Project, and I believe it will be a great use for my presentation.