| abstract | - In general, copyright registration is a legal formality intended to make a public record of the basic facts of a particular copyright. The copyright owner of a work (or the owner of any of the exclusive rights) may register the copyright in the work by depositing with the Copyright Office a completed copyright application form, registration fee and a copy or copies of the work. The deposit requirement under the Act may be fulfilled through the registration procedures. Throughout much of U.S. history, copyright protection was predicated on certain formal requirements, such as the need to register published works with the Copyright Office, deposit copies with the Library of Congress, and mark copies of the work with a copyright notice. However, major revisions to copyright law in the 1970s and 1980s now protect a copyrightable work regardless of whether these formalities have been observed. For a work created on or after January 1, 1978, copyright subsists from the moment an original work of authorship is created by "fix[ing it] in any tangible medium of expression." That is, a work is copyrighted the moment it is created, regardless of whether it has been registered or bears a copyright notice. A copyright is the author's legal entitlement to the exclusive rights granted under 17 U.S.C. ยง106. Neither a copyright registration nor a registration certificate is equivalent to a copyright. A registration certificate signifies the Copyright Office's decision to register the work, which is a limited administrative decision that the work is copyrightable and that the application is proper. That decision to register and the certificate of registration can, however, have legal significance at trial. The Copyright Office classifies works into four broad categories for purposes of registration: nondramatic literary works, works of performing arts, works of visual arts, and sound recordings. The Copyright Office notes that in cases "where a work contains elements of authorship in which copyright is claimed which fall into two or more classes, the application should be submitted in the class most appropriate to the type of authorship that predominates in the work as a whole." However, the Copyright Act makes clear that the Copyright Office classification of works for purposes of registration "has no significance with respect to the subject matter of copyright or the exclusive rights provided."
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