Protecting Asses World Wide. Bigfoots and Copyrights
Well, not really, but it certainly makes me sound important. Only, it could be famous last words if it is already a trademarked or copyrighted phrase or slogan. I can say honestly I didn’t check it out. And probably still won’t. Protection is certainly something we all struggle with, especially when we get excited about something. There have been friendships, careers and fortunes lost as a result. But still, for some reason, we leave ourselves vulnerable. We leave ourselves wide open for hurt when protecting ourselves should have been our first priority.
A few excellent Bigfoot and Paranormal groups were kind enough to answer a few questions for me in regards to the protection of their intellectual property, and not surprising, most of us (yes, I included myself in this) have not bothered with even the bare minimum of protection that will cost us nothing but time, but could potentially mean everything, should another group take and trademark it legally for themselves.
Trademarks cover things such as; words, names, symbols, etc. There's a free and easy way to cover yourself here. Common law is a basic protection we are covered by. Basically this just means, you create it, therefore it’s yours. Blogs, YouTube videos, Podcasts and Pictures are your intellectual property as soon as they are released. Your logos and symbols you can protect by adding (tm) next to it. It costs nothing but a few minutes of your time and is completely legal to apply. For your blog or video you can write at the bottom or somewhere on YouTube, etc. "copyright 2018, property of .....all rights reserved". For extra protection on your video you can also add "no part of this video may be reproduced..."etc. Now, it may not necessarily hold up in a court like a Federal Trademark would, but that costs around three to four hundred and your company, for lack of a better term, must conduct business outside of your home state. If you do decide to file, however, you’re protected from date of filing, not date of approval.
Our second issue here is that we are not only not protecting our intellectual properties, but our collective asses. Most of us...mostly, me... aren’t checking to see if we are infringing on anyone else’s copyright or trademarked work. We find out when we get a strike or warning from the social media site we are attempting to post on. I know, I’ve gotten flagged. There are websites out there that will check out songs and such for you to see if it’s what they call “free use”. Also, if you are interviewing someone or putting someone else in your video with you, then you should have permission slips at the ready. I know your thinking, “hey, these guys are my buddies lady”. But you know what? Tomorrow they may hate you or vice versa. And they could make you take that video down baby. Ladies reading this, you know how it goes. Your besties til she winks at your man, then the gloves are off. Get the signature.
This infringement worries me. I always try to find the name of an artist if I’m using pictures in my blog but it’s not always possible. For instance, I couldn’t find anybody that created the pictures in this post, but I’m using them. If they are found on Google, there is rarely a name listed. My blog itself is usually safe because most of everything comes from my head. No one wants to go in there and listen, believe me. But still, I have felt as though I’d been plagiarized at least twice now. It was upsetting to see essentially my whole blog post, put out there by someone else. The only difference was, where I am light and silly usually, they made it more serious. But mostly all the same wording. I had to watch people retweet, like and share it. Saying they liked it. I’m like "thank you,because I’m pretty sure I’m the one that wrote it!!" There are YouTube channels created that are solely "borrowing" one of their colleagues videos, taking away views from them. So please, be careful not to do that. It’s actually painful to see. Know where the line is when approaching the same subject matter. And credit the other if you borrowed a bit...or all. And definitely credit any articles, books, songs you used at the end. It doesn’t hurt your work any and you will be more respected for giving the credit and putting it out there.
If you like your ass, or maybe if someone else likes your ass, then take a minute of your time and do these few simple things to protect it. I doubt that we would get sued any time soon, but we Bigfoot people are not a rare thing anymore. Groups, blogs, podcasts are popping up everywhere. Don’t hand your intellectual property over to them to use. Most of us aren’t making the money, all we have is our name and our reputations so guard it closely..
Below are a couple articles on the subject to help you get started.
https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/lets-get-ready-to-rumble-trademarking-your-catch-phrase
https://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2009/09/09/5-free-copyright-steps-every-blogger-should-take-today/
https://www.godaddy.com/garage/how-to-copyright-a-blog-and-protect-your-content/
https://www.dacast.com/blog/how-to-copyright-a-video/
https://creatoracademy.youtube.com/page/lesson/copyright-protection
Government page, to apply for copyright below
https://www.uspto.gov/
Photos found on google search
I want to thank all the groups that took the time to answer this girls silly questions. Anonymous ones included..😊
I want to give a special shout out to the Paranormal Punchers who got the most questions. Love your Podcast, I’m a fan and an iTunes subscriber of yours.
And a special mention to World Bigfoot Radio, he not only inspired this post, but he may be the only one I know, before I started researching everything, that was protecting himself and his intellectual property.
Big thanks to Blue Ridge Bigfoot, another great one 😆 lol and for being a good friend😊
Thanks to wpihuntsthetruth for not just answering any questions on this subject but also the 10,000 other questions I usually have🤓
Copyright 2018, property of Bigfoot Mountain (tm) all rights reserved.
Sasysquatchgirl@gmail.com
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