[NEohioPAL]note to screenwriters

[Christopher]

Greetings,

It has been great to see brewing interest in screenwriting in the NE
Ohio area.  A word of caution about protecting your work however:
sending yourself a copy of your screenplay will NOT protect you in the
event of an infringement.  It is very easy to cheat the system, and a
person who wants to steal your ideas is hoping that is the only way
you've protected yourself.  Here's why:

If you are in the business of stealing intellectual property, all you
would have to do is send yourself an unsealed envelope with postage
appropriate for a 120 page screenplay (or for really cheap people,
postage for a CD ROM).  Then, when you decide to hawk someone else's
hard work, all you have to do is put hard copy in the postmarked
unsealed envelope and seal it, then cry foul.  Even if you are the
plaintiff in an infringement case, an experienced defendant will
introduce the possibility that you performed the above detailed fraud to
weigh the preponderance of evidence in their favor.  Remember, copyright
infringement is a civil matter, not a criminal matter, the standard of
evidence is not defined as beyond a reasonable doubt, but rather simply
after weighing the preponderance of evidence.  The burden of proof is on
you, the one infringed against to prove the other person stole your
ideas from you.

Sending yourself a copy of your work will not protect you.

Better:  Take a copy of your work to a third party computer like kinko's
and burn it to CD.  The creation date on the CD will stand a better
chance of withholding scrutiny, since the creation date of your own
computer can be easily manipulated.

Better still:  Send your work to the copyright office.  Don't have a
full screenplay, but want to protect your idea?  Send a treatment (a 4-5
page summary of your entire screenplay) for copyright.  Granted, it
takes a long time to get a certificate of copyright in your hands, but
copyright is recognized the day the copyright office receives your work
in the mail, provided you followed their instructions (filled out the
form correctly and sent them the money.)  The short form is only one
page, and it costs $30.  It's a small price to pay to avoid the
disappointment of watching someone else make money off of your work...
like I have.

I will send a .pdf of the short form via email to anyone who requests
one.  It can be found in the U.S. office of copyrights website after a
tiny amount of digging, but I keep a copy to print out, because they get
copious celebrity stalker amounts of mail submissions from me.

got your back,
Christopher K. Young
www.shallowfocus.com