The problem of copyright differs a lot according the different Countries.
Here in Italy we have a sort of special agency (named SIAE, and which
takles a percentage of all the books, or the tickets of cinema, or
exhibitions, or other forms of public performance) and both the authors and
the single work must be registered there to have the enforcement of the
copyright. But, as a matter of fact, copyrighting anything different from a
literature  or theater or music work (or photographs) prooves to be
impossible.
Copyrighting magazines seems a sort of foolish operation which costs a lot
and does not give you any (I repeat, any) kind of real legal guarantee that
your rights will be actually defended or recognized.
From another point of view, our country signed the international convention
on the author rights, but there is no legal way to really have it enforced.
Even depositing for example your book of poems (before publishing it), will
not allow you to have your poems automatically protected: only, if you
discover an unauthorized use of the poems, you can start a normal pursuit
in the court...and then the fact of having them deposited at SIAE will help
you in having your position defended.
I guess that, especially in the scientific field, se should simply rely on
our reciprocal good faith and will to cooperate to the common goal of
improving the knowledge in the field we are dealing with.
 
 
Maria
Rome, Italy
 
Maria Antonietta Fontana Angioy
Evolver srl - La Conchiglia
Rome, Italy