on this thread show, copyright is a very complex issue. I'm not a lawyer either but I did work for a bit in RL in the UK Patent office, which handles copyright matters here in the UK; this left me with the distinct feeling that in my next life (if I have one) I'd like to be a copyright lawyer as it's an intellectually intriguing area which also pays very well *s*.

As far as the works we as AW participants create are concerned, Laurels' view would be correct for the UK- copyright comes automatically to the author/creator without them having to take any additional steps (though I note that in UK published books these days there is a growing tendency of authors to assert their rights under the latest version of UK copyright law anyway) and this is true whether the work has been formally published or not. This isn't true everywhere, though; I seem to recall that in Canada you have to register a work for copyright purposes and that's also true in quite a few continental European jurisdictions.

Another little quirk which seems to have been missed on the "other " side of the issue (potential infringements by AW participants of copyrights held by others)- copyright term. I think I'm right in saying that in the US it's 50 years after the death of the author/creator. In the EU, however, it's 70. It used to be 50 in the UK but there was a degree of harmonisation of copyright law across the EU about ten years ago and the term was set at the longest term in force within the EU as it then stood, which was 70 years; this posed problems for material which had come into public domain and then went back into copyright and we're still working through the transitional regime. It also potentially causes issues for sites like AW which have a global reach. This is perhaps qualified by the thought that I suspect it might not be that easy in practice for a European right holder to go after AW for posting material which is still in copyright in Europe but isn't in the US- even if the person doing the posting might well themself be an EU citizen or resident and properly subject to European law. Another one of the many complexities which the internet causes in the copyright field and which keep the copyright lawyers of my acquaintance in their Armani suits and Porsches......