Filing a copyright registration with the Copyright Office is the first step any author or artist should take before making his or her work available to the public. However, the Copyright Office may inadvertently include errors in the copyright filing that become visible on its public online catalog database. Errors in the author name or title of the work may appear in the registration, especially if the application was submitted in paper form. Submitting a copyright application via the Copyright Office eCO website can help to minimize the risk of errors in the registration information.

However, if you find an error in the online record for a work in which you hold a copyright, you should determine whether the Copyright Office can update the records with the correct information. If you filed additional documents related to an existing filing, the Copyright Office may create an additional online record for the new documents that appear confusing both to you and to potential licensees of your works, making it more difficult to contact you to obtain a license. For example, if a musician and a record company settled a dispute regarding the musician’s songs, committed the agreement to writing, and then filed the settlement agreement with the Copyright Office, the Copyright Office may create a new record in its catalog specifically for the settlement agreement.  The new record may appear to be a replacement for the original copyright registration for the songs, but it is only an informational tool intended to indicate that a document was filed regarding the previously registered songs. The new record will reflect the contents of the settlement agreement.

If you filed a copyright registration and you think there may be errors in the Copyright Office’s records, or if you are confused about seemingly conflicting records regarding your copyright, you should contact counsel experienced in communicating with the Copyright Office and correcting copyright registration errors.