By now, we all know that, when signing freelance writing contracts, you need to be copyright smart and make sure that you aren’t giving away more rights to your work than you intended.

But many don’t understand what the big deal about signing over copyright to their work is. Most freelance writers don’t resell the same work to several clients, and act that is considered to be very bad form when it is done without prior knowledge, and often times freelance writers never have any intention to ever return to the topic again.

In short, for many freelance writers, once they submit a work, they are done with it and probably won’t ever see it again.

But, while this is true, that doesn’t mean that you can simply toss the copyright to the piece aside and be done with it completely. Even if you never think you’re going to look at the work again, there are many reasons why signing over the copyright is a bad idea or, at the very least, something you should think twice about.

With that in mind, here are five very good reasons to keep copyright in the works you write for others. [Read more…]