There's no real legal protection in posting something to yourself or in registering it, or in having a sealed copy notarized.
What you establish that the finished work existed on a certain date, and that you claim to have authored it (obviously before that date).
There's no copyright on an idea, only on the expression of an idea. If you could protect an idea, you couldn't have Medium and Ghost Whisperer on tv; they're the same idea. So, if someone wrote something very similar to your idea, you would have no protection anyway.
If you beleived someone had stolen your script, slipped in a few changes and passed it off as their own, you would need to prove that there were so many close similarities or identical points that it could not be coincidence or "collective consciousness", that your work was completed first, and that the other person had knowledge of and access to your script when they created theirs. Very difficult to do.
But, if posting or registering it makes you sleep better at night, then go for it. Be aware that you have to do it separately for each draft. Once you rewrite, it's a new "expression of an idea", a separate entity, even though it develops from the previous draft.
-------------
SF08: Gethsemane - Thriller
SF08: Shooting - Comedy - 105 pages - done
Good luck to you all.
|
