Which trademark or copyright symbol do I use?

One of the most common questions I get is about which symbol to use. Here is a handy cheat sheet I made:

• ® – a.k.a “circle-R” – Registered trademark with the USPTO
• TM – Unregistered mark, used with products and tangle items
• SM – Unregistered service mark, used with services
• © – Beginning of copyright notice (along with year of creating and author — see lower right corned of the above graphic for example); not necessarily registered with the Library of Congress (can use whether registered or not registered).

For more, see my video: