PMC?
In looking at this acronym it may not become immediately clear what’s being referred too. However if I said, "Poor Mans Copyright" most songwriters and musicians immediately chime in and explain this process of protecting ones original material for just the cost of a postage stamp. If you are one of the three people in the world unfamiliar with this process ;o ) let me explain.

Poor Man's Copyright is a method utilizing the postal service or other trusted shipping service to date your intellectual property by simply mailing or sending it to yourself to establish when the work was completed and in your possession. The thought is in reviewing the postmark date on the sealed envelope that this would convincingly establish you as owner of the material inside on and after that date. The problem with this method is that there are so many ways to invalidate the date.

So you ask, how can you fake a postmark date? Well it's not faking the date as much as the date on the envelope doesn't serve as real proof of when the items were placed in the envelope. Let's say I mailed an empty envelope to myself or better yet a couple of them. You see I would want a couple top 10 Hits! Anyway, I mail some empty unsealed envelopes to myself and then years later put a recording of one of those hits I heard from the radio inside. Using this method I could easily claim ownership to possibly the next 10 top ten hits only looking a few years out. In doing a quick "GOOGLE" search I found no court cases where this method of copywriting was used successfully in even a single court case.


Now let me stop here and say, we are not lawyers and in no way trying to give out legal advice on the subject.

However as musicians, I know when I create an original work and if I'm lucky enough to have it recognized as a work worthy of making money I would sure hate to loose out because I only had some unopened mail to prove the song everyone is hearing on the radio and television is mine.

So before you run out and purchase that book of stamps and box of envelopes you may want to think about this, do your own research and come to your own conclusion.