Copyright

Although a work is copyrighted the moment the work is written, recorded, or fixed in any medium, registering the copyright for your work provides protection should a legal challenge of ownership arise.

The U.S. Copy Office provides information on how to register the copyright for your work.

Creative Commons

In order to grow a corpus of creative and scholarly work that can be shared and used by many, the Creative Commons provides a way for authors and creators of works to designate that their work can be used by others.

Those wishing to share their work with others but define the ways in which it can be used (e.g., for noncommercial purposes only, or only by attributing the creator of the work) should pursue a Creative Commons License.