Not sure about your company choice as it would seem that licensing fees and tax rates will vary by state and even by specific county/parish and city. Also, the amount of liability that your business would have in regards to being sued would also vary depending on your location.
As for copyright, legally, as soon as you fix an idea to paper, disk or any physical form other than in your head then you have a copyright. However, proving that you have said copyright in a court of law later when someone else tries to sell your idea, will be difficult if you don''t have your copyright registered. This process is fairly simple and cost efficient. Registering trademarks is likewise a good idea if you have anything catchy you don''t want others to use. getting a patent on your software design will take time and probably money and as of recently AFAIK it''s pretty difficult to actually patent a program or a type of code.
The most important advice I could give you is to hire a dreadful attorney, or at least take council with one. Most are willing to give a little advice during a free counsultation, but then again, that amount of advice will be limited. When starting a company an attorney is almost required as somoeone out there for some reason will want to sue you for something.
Either your game will crash at least one system or something else will crash a system and your game will get blamed or the game will be so addictive someone will stop working to play the game and then sue you because they lost their house. Either way, it''s a fairly certain guarantee that in the computer software world, you will at some time or another be sued
Get used to the idea. I suppose there are exceptions to every rule and you may get lucky, but in the end it''s more important that you keep your nose and your business clean, and frankly, if you don''t know the difference between Inc. and LLC then I highly suggest an attorney or someone with good experience in the business world. There is a lot more to running a business than just filing tax papers and making a profit (or a loss). As hated as attorneys generally are, they are as helpful to a company as a compiler is to a programmer.
Again, this is just my advice, feel free to jump right in and do your best. To my knowledge, anyone with the licensing fees can officially own a legal business. It is just my opinion to seek council with a professional. Not all people who post here are professionals believe it or not
I''m not, that''s for sure!
Take it with a grain (or bottle) of salt.
Webby
