All rights reserved meaning and basics!

The creative work on which you spend hours to produce requires legal protection. To do so, first, you need to understand copyright and all rights reserved meaning. 

Let’s start with all rights reserved meaning and its basic definition moving towards how it’s obtained.

The phrase, copyright all rights reserved means the owner of the work has reserved all the rights given to him/her under the copyright law of the US. For instance, the pictures you see on photo-hosting websites with the phrase “copyright all rights reserved” in the description imply that the picture is legally owned by the person who uploaded it. 

Basics of copyrights

Copyrights are used to protect original works like painting, art, books, play scripts, musical lyrics, photographs, etc. These original works are copyrighted the moment they come into existence. However, you need to understand that having a copyright is different from protecting copyright. 

There are two ways to prove you reserve rights to your property.

1) insert a notice on your work stating “copyright all rights reserved”

2) list your work in the United States copyright office.

If you want to make a wise decision, then take on both options. This way you will notify others about your legitimate rights to your work and will prevent them from violating. 

In case of infringement, you can file a lawsuit against that party to protect your work. You can further prove it by showing the copyright notice of your work bear or by showing the registration documents of your work with the US copyright office.

How to write a copyright notice

A copyright notice can be written in three ways. All of them are simple and similar, you just need to comply with standard practices. For instance, if Mark Twain writes a new book in 2021 and publishes it, he will use any of these three notices to prevent copyright infringement. 

• 2021 Mark Twain
• Copyright 2021 Mark Twain
• 2021 Mark Twain

By using any of these, he is implying that the work is his property and he owned it in 2021. Placing such lines on work not only protects it from infringement but also notifies others that they cannot claim it as their property as it already bears a copyright notice. Still, if anyone does this unintentionally, he/she won’t be able to prove It in court.

The copyrights notice listed above prove that the owner of the work has reserved all the rights under the US copyright law. 

All rights reserved meaning

You often see the phrase “All rights reserved” placed on print or digital media, this is to notify it as protected against copyright violations. For instance,”2021 Mark Twain. All rights reserved. 

The statement said that nobody may use the work that carries this notice, permission must be obtained from the owner before using it. However, the statement has no legal worth, using it is not mandatory. If you have registered your work under US copyright law, your work will still be protected. However, repeatedly using copyright notices alerts others to avoid stealing.

There’s another phrase “No rights reserved” typically used on public properties. This is used to inform others that using the work with this statement written on it may not harm anyone. This is specially done for charity purposes or when owners of the property want it to reach a wide audience for use.

It is not necessary to use the phrase “all rights reserved” as it is not required by the law, however, doing so will clarify people not familiar with the copyright rules. 

If you are a content creator, get your work copyrighted immediately otherwise, you will end up paying hefty fees from lawyers when someone files a copyright claim to your work. It is always the best idea to get copyrights to your work reserved beforehand.