Copyrighting Iggi and Omar

Back in 2009, I went throught the process of copyrighting A Fly, a Bee and a Whistle: The Adventures of Iggi and Omar. 

This is "a story told by 3 narrators"  that I wrote back in 2004 and shared originally at the Creative Worship night at my church.   I didn't have to copyright it, as I have no real plan to ever try to have it published, but I wanted to go through and understand the copyright process.   It took about a year from when I applied until I got the official paperwork, which I received recently in 2010.

The beginnings of this project came from divine inspiration of God.  Sounds pretty awesome, huh?   It was.  I was reading in Isaiah when I came across verses 18 and 19 in chapter 7.  In the New American Standard version, they read, "In that day the LORD will whistle for the fly that is in the remotest part of the rivers of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. They will all come and settle on the steep ravines, on the ledges of the cliffs, on all the thorn bushes and on all the watering places.”

I thought, "How cool!"  The Lord of all creation can just whistle and creation responds! I should write a story about this.   And I did. 

As I wanted it to be something interactive that could be used in worship, I added 3 narrators to tell the story, two often speaking in the voices of the main characters, Iggi the fly and Omar the bee.  The third narrator was the Voice of God.   I was pleased with the result and it became part of a very special night of creative worship.

In 2009, I decided to pursue copyrighting, again simply to understand how it works. Turns out, you can do everything through a website: http://www.copyright.gov/.   I simply needed to fill out the on-line forms, attach an electronic copy of my work, and pay the fee.  Viola!  Copyright.   Again, it took over a year from submitting the application to obtaining the copyright documents (the site says 4.5 to 15 months processing time), but I have it, and you can see it below.
  





Also, you can look it up on the http://www.copyright.gov/ site and see my info.  I think that's pretty neat!

So my story is now registered out there, and should it ever be published, can include the following tag:

A Fly, a Bee and a Whistle: The Adventures of Iggi and Omar

Copyright © 2009 by Robert Edward Wright

"Scripture quotations taken from the New American Standard Bible^®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.  Used by permission."

All in all, a fun time of creating something new to bring a little more glory to God.  And just perhaps, maybe a sequel is now in order!