Originally Posted by QKO

All you have to do is to claim a copyright on your intellectual property. To do this, put the following notice on each page of your pattern:

Copyright © 2010, [yourcompany or name]. All rights reserved.

You'll want to update your notice each year. The "All rights reserved" part covers all those "do not do this, and do not do that" things that some people are fond of putting all over the place. Those are really just wastes of space unless you feel your audience needs an education about what they can and can't do with your pattern.

Copyright notices and copyrights are only as good as your ability to enforce them, however. If you see your work being copied you can do anything up to and including a lawsuit to try to get justice, but you won't find any law enforcement agency to help you when there is a violation of your copyright.