ProtectMyWork.com acts as an indepentant witness, witnessing ownership of your work and the date of registration.
Why Do I Need ProtectMyWork.com?
Copyright is an automatic right under international law but if your work is used without your permission, you'll have to prove ownership of your work and the date it was created. This can be harder to do than it sounds.
For example, if you take a photo on your phone, how do you prove that the photo is yours and shot on your phone?
The Poor Man's Copyright
The old way of doing this was to print the photo, put it in an envelope and post it to yourself. The date stamp from the post office would be your proof-of-date and inside would be your photo. This was know as "The Poor Man's Copyright".
Today, this is ineffective. If you post your photo on Instagram and its used without your permission, you can't send an envelope to Instagram and ask them to look inside. Additionally, once you open the envelope, it can't be used again as evidence.
ProtectMyWork.com is a digital, independant witness.