From the US Copyright Office website:

"Copyright protection subsists from the time the work is created in fixed
form. The copyright in the work of authorship immediately becomes the
property of the author who created the work. Only the author or those
deriving their rights through the author can rightfully claim copyright."

....and

"Copyright Secured Automatically upon Creation
The way in which copyright protection is secured is frequently
misunderstood. No publication or registration or other action in the
Copyright Office is required to secure copyright. (See following Note.)
There are, however, certain definite advantages to registration. See
"Copyright Registration."

Copyright is secured automatically when the work is created, and a work is
"created" when it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord for the first time.
"Copies" are material objects from which a work can be read or visually
perceived either directly or with the aid of a machine or device, such as
books, manuscripts, sheet music, film, videotape, or microfilm.
"Phonorecords" are material objects embodying fixations of sounds
(excluding, by statutory definition, motion picture soundtracks), such as
cassette tapes, CDs, or LPs. Thus, for example, a song (the "work") can be
fixed in sheet music (" copies") or in phonograph disks (" phonorecords"),
or both."
--

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