Can Your Million-Dollar Idea be Protected?

Here’s a scary thought–ideas are not protected by copyright law, no matter how unique and valuable. If you give your elevator pitch in an elevator, anyone who overhears you may snitch it.

Copyright law applies only when a work is fixed into tangible form, such as a notepad or computer file. Even then, copyright law will not protect a core idea. But contract law might.

Some people will advise you to have agents, editors and beta readers sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement, commonly called an NDA, be...