Stim does not protect against plagiarism and theft

Stim's primary task is to ensure that our members get paid when their music is played. However, registering your music with Stim is not protection against plagiarism or theft.

Protect your music

A musical work is automatically protected by copyright under the Copyright Act as soon as it is created, regardless of whether the work exists in sheet music, is recorded, or is included in Stim's register. Registering it with Stim means you get paid when the work is played or released - it therefore provides no protection against copyright infringement.

Prove that you have written a song

To be able to prove that you had the material on a certain date you can send your demo, or sheet music and lyrics, in a registered letter with return receipt to yourself, and keep the shipment unopened. This does not, however, prove that you are the one who wrote the music or lyrics, but the postmark date can be important in a dispute. This must be done before the music has begun to be distributed.

There are also a number of services that offer digital timestamping for files that can help you prove that you had the material on a specific date.