How do I protect my music OTHER than by copyright.

Okay, I know that copyrighting is the tried and true method of protecting your artistic works. But, I'm stuck in a spot where I'm about to submit some beats to an artist and I don't have the money to copyright the tracks right now. This is mostly due to the fact that I don't want to copyright just 2 songs. But, time is running on the amount of time I have to send the beats to this cat.

Now, I looked into the creative commons licensing process, but they SPECIFICALLY state that their licensing should not be seen as an alternative to an actual copyright, but rather an addendum to an already established copyright.

I was thinking of using my usual method of putting a vocal "id" throughout the tracks, but, I know that that can get very annoying, but I'm really left with no other option at this point.

Are there any other methods?

And please, no one don't suggest the poor man's method of mailing the songs to myself on a cd through the postal service. That does not hold up in court.

I guess what I'm trying to prevent is this cat from just looping up portions of the tracks or just putting my beats on a mixtape, thus lessening their value.

Please, any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thank you.

On some level the fact that you have the masters and can break the track down to its very first sound is evidence.

You could have him sign a legally binding contract where he acknowledges the beats are yours and credit, plus a see gratuity should be given.

Other than that:

Thanks. Great feedback.

and you could also use a tag . . .

bedouin wrote:
You could have him sign a legally binding contract where he acknowledges the beats are yours and credit, plus a see gratuity should be given.

^^^^^^^^^^^ What he said ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Mike Dugan wrote:and you could also use a tag . . .

What kind of tag do you have in mind?

audio watermarking?

http://www.musictrace.de/technologies/w ... ing.en.htm

i have heard of it, but i don't know how it's applied. or weather it's something you can do on your own. but it is an option.

Nobody's mentioned this yet? http://creativecommons.org/

Someone told me that if you mail yourself a master copy of the data/cd, the postmark on the envalope would serve as a poor mans copyright. Havent looked into cases, but i have researched, and a postmark with an address and name does grant ownership.

your best solution is to COPYRIGHT!!!


Having the masters of it being tracked out is nonthin, people will remake the track, put their own sounds in it, now they have their own master tracked out. The Difference is, if they copyright the song before you, because you are sitting on you Master Track Break Down, The song pretty much belongs to them now. Yeah, it could be different sounds in the song, but songs get stolen all the time, because people take certain elements that make the songs up. Thats just the game, it happens all the time, producers get sued all the time. They love myspace, cause some of yall talented cats have a great melody, but whack sounds and production surrounding the perfect element and thats all they need is that idea to make their song. Now you are sitting at home thinking, dang, i had a song that sounded like that.

Songs are stolen in so many different ways, its not funny

what if theres a sample in there. is it cool to copyright that without clearance?

Copper_Tony wrote:what if theres a sample in there. is it cool to copyright that without clearance?

ummm...let m think for a second....NO
Dude the sample has to be so chopped that it is barely if not at all recognizable. Now i do know you dont need pemission for note extraction, or chopping a sample to an individual note. But yeah, if u fukk wit the big game, they wont sue your broke ass, but they will send u to jail if you try to sell your ish.

you don't need to apply or register for copyright, if you made it, you have copyright.

but that being said, copyright is a joke. it doesn't protect you from anything, unless you have a lawyer and a big bag of money. then you would have to prove your made it first.