Lotsa Thinkin' Goin' On

I pondered the differences of trademark vs. patent vs. copyright. What do I need to get for these guys before we get really into it and find out someone has taken the idea or worse yet, already had the idea and I didn't know it.

Googling those three is no easy task - all the proper governmental websites have pages and pages full of big, hard to grasp words that seem to talk in circles.

Why can't anybody just make a point anymore? I blame all those english classes that force people to write descriptive sentences and extra paragraphs, and now these poor people think that's what they have to do is fill pages full of extra words for a good grade.

Perhaps this is why I like Twitter. It's 140 characters - you have to get to the point.

Ok. Side rant. Done.

From what I've been able to grasp of the skimming (because reading all that stuff was making my eyes dry out) and from Gina who is sorting out her own copyright/trademark/patent issues.

So. If I understand it correctly, I need to copyright.

But what?

Each character? The name? My name & list everything under it? The design? The idea?

I have no clue. I have 12 pages of the "Copyright Synopsis" - the short version - of how it's supposed to work and what I need to do. And then there are eight pages of things to fill out and send my hard earned-from-my-day-job money in to take care of. If I can do it once, that would be better, but if I need to do this for each idea & character - then I'm gonna give up right here. I'm not that ambitious, I hate to say. Just too much damn work to design a few things.

But that's where I need to do it, I know. Because I can design & draw & write & Rob can sculpt & if they're not "protected" then someone else could come along and do the "too much damn work" and it would disappear.

Sigh.

Why can't I just create? Why does it have to be so hard to deal with the rest of it?

I have ideas for a line of cards, for paintings, for sculptures, for carvings, for these characters - and I'm tired from my day job and from trying to figure out the "how-to" stuff... Where's the gnome to sort it all out for me?

On other notes - spent the weekend with Amber & Bobbi down in Menard & over in Fredericksburg - lots of ideas. Lots of hope & possibility. Lots of "If these people can make their own unique business work, then so can I. Someday. I hope."

And in other notes - I figured out I much prefer taking pictures looking up than looking down. Catch some beautiful sight lines this way.



So. Maybe this means I need to look at things from another perspective. Get down on the ground more often. Get down to the "doing" and figure out the cover-your-a$$ legal stuff later. Keep it all in the dark just a bit longer till it becomes more apparent.

Or just magically falls into place by itself.