Register your copyright or you cannot sue for infringement in the US

[aeshnidae]

Just a heads up, in late March 2019, the US Supreme Court reaffirmed that in order to sue for copyright infringement in the United States, your copyright must be registered with the US Copyright Office. If you have not registered your copyright, you still own copyright in your works and other people have no right to use your copyrighted works, but you can't actually sue for infringement unless your copyright is registered. (You can recover for infringements that occur prior to registering your copyright, though.)

The fee to register online, for basic protection, is $35. See the US Copyright Office FAQ and the US Copyright Office Fees, particularly page 7.

The Supreme Court case is Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corp. v. Wall-Street.Com.

If you have questions, post here I'll do my best to provide answers.

ETA: This post is really for US citizens and non-US citizens who live in the US. Foreign (that is, non-US) works don't need to worry about this because foreign works are protected by the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. I think even if a non-US citizen wanted to sue in US court for copyright infringement, you would not first have to register with the US Copyright Office because US courts will look to the Berne Convention and apply that in lieu of US copyright law.