Postal registration formats

The following are items which are know to caused confusion and instructions on how to deal with these items.

Three dimensional work such as sculptures

Because copyright exists regardless of format, to register three dimensional items it is only necessary to include photographs or images of the work. Photographs are perfectly adequate to record the nature, content and design of your work. At least one picture should show the entire work, and close ups of any specific or intricate detail should be included where applicable. It is a good idea to include something in the images that gives an idea of scale, a person or a ruler are common choices.

Board games

Board games can be registered by submitting the following with your application form:

• Rules of the game,
• Description of the game - The goal, concepts, etc.,
• The design of the playing area,
• The design of any cards, counters, player pieces etc.,

Computer files, scanned images, paper prints are admissible for all features above.

Inventions and patentable ideas

Although copyright does not directly protect these items, (it protects the content of the document registered rather than the idea itself), many inventors find it valuable to register documents detailing their ideas and inventions prior to obtaining a patent. This is because a copyright registration is much faster than a patent application, and ensures that the work has some protection in the short term, and may be helpful in the event of problems during the patent process.

Names, titles & phrases

Names, titles & phrases are not copyright items in their own right, and should not be lodged by themselves.

Logos can be registered as long as they combine the name with a design element and therefore qualify as copyright works, the registration also provides some evidence that you were there first.

Although more expensive, companies should also consider registering a trademark. More information on trademarks and other types of intellectual property can be found via our intellectual property rights page.

Websites

Websites are actually a very common thing to register, but often cause confusion.

If the site is built offline and published to your webhosting, the basic rule is that you should submit to us the same files that you would place on your web server.

For sites built withing a content management systems (Wordpress, Concrete 5, ModX etc.) , you shoudl submit:

• A back up of the site; i.e. the same as you would use if migrating to a fresh wordpress install with a new hosting provider. That should contain all the content.
• Screenshots of key pages (to show the overall 'look and feel' without the need to restore a backup).
• Any specific images, files, etc. that users can view/download (artwork, PDF files, etc.) if they are not included in (or not directly readable from) the back up.

Alternatively you could use a tool like GNU Wget to download the site contents into a 'standalone' version of the site (sometimes this does not do a complete job - so you should check all the files are there).

For postal registrations, the best option is to send a copy of the entire site on a CD along with the registration form.

If you register using the online registration facility, then we recommend that you use an archive program such as WinZip, WinRar/Rar, 7-Zip, StuffIt, or Tar to combines all the files into a single archive file which you then upload during registration. This will ensure that the directory structure of the site is preserved.

For more information, please see our factsheet P-23: Registering websites.

Compressed or encrypted files

Compressed files

We accept any compressed files, although we recommend that a standard format (i.e. zip, mpg) is used. With all electronic files you should choose common formats to ensure software to read the files will be available in the future.

Encrypted (password protected) files

We will accept, but do not recommend encryption. If you do encrypt your files it is your responsibility to ensure that you have the means to decrypt the files for the lifetime of the registration.

Still not found what you want?

If you are still unsure, contact one of our service advisors, who will be happy to discuss your needs.