With most people spending the majority of their time at home this past year, it comes as no surprise that many turned to their hobbies to help pass the time.
Some people even found ways to turn their hobbies into a profit (and a community) by turning them into an online course.
Online courses are an excellent way to share your passion and expertise with fellow creatives, and are a great resource for those who wish to learn new skills and pick up new hobbies.
You can create an online course to teach almost anything – floristry, musical arrangement, cooking, marketing...
As long as you’re passionate and dedicated to your subject, there are always customers who want to learn what you have to teach!
A lot of hard work goes into the creation of an online course – and so, as with any other form of intellectual property, it is important to protect your work against the possibility of infringement.
Choose the right intellectual property protection
If you decide to make a business out of creating online courses, then a trademark may be an appropriate method of protection for your business name and branding assets.
However, to protect the individual elements of your course, then copyright may be the best form of protection.
Copyright exists from the moment that your work is put into a tangible form (such as a video or written draft) but can also be registered to garner an additional layer of protection.
This is especially useful when publishing your work online.
Copyright registration at Copyright House means that a real digital copy of your work is stored in our secure databases upon submission with a date and time stamp.
If your work is ever infringed upon, this stamp can be used to prove your ownership as of that date.
We can also issue free DMCA take-down notices upon the first instance that you notice that your work is being used without your permission.
You can submit your online course as a whole, or as individual sections.
Registering your course before you share it, and including a watermark on all drafts are great ways to cement your ownership and create a water-tight case against infringement.
Submitting your work for registration is easy, simple, and can help to take away some of the stress from online publishing in the long-run.
Disclaimer: The information given on this website does not constitute legal advice. We recommend that you seek specialist legal advice in accordance with specific circumstances
