Moniker Stage-Name Filing and Renewal Tracker
For performers and creators in California trading under a stage name

The name on the contract expired in June.

Moniker keeps each fictitious business name you trade under — the filing, the four weeks in the newspaper, the five-year expiry, and every change that starts the 40-day clock — and will not confirm a name current while any of them has lapsed.

Opens in this browser with an invented performer already in it. No account, no email address, nothing installed.

Moniker with its example records in itOpen the free demo →

The problem

A filed name does not stay filed.

In California, trading under a name that is not your legal name means filing a fictitious business name statement with the county clerk, publishing it in a newspaper once a week for four weeks, and filing again every five years — or within 40 days of moving, changing owners or changing the business. A payout account or a contract under a lapsed name is a contract under no registered name.

30 days

to start publication after filing, once a week for four weeks, as the Los Angeles County Clerk sets it out.

LA County Clerk →
5 years

after filing, the statement expires.

Cal. B&P Code 17920 →
40 days

after any change in the facts it states, the statement expires too.

Cal. B&P Code 17920 →

Will not confirm a name that has lapsed.

Not a reminder. Confirm the name is current refuses, naming the reason, while there is no statement, publication started more than 30 days after filing, fewer than four weekly publications or no proof is recorded, the statement is five years old, or a change is more than 40 days old with no new statement. There is no override.

How it works

File, publish, keep current

Record the filing

The date the clerk stamped and the statement number.

Record the publication

Each of the four weekly dates, and the proof of publication.

Record every change

A move, a new partner, a new business type — Moniker counts the 40 days and the five years.

What it will never do

It keeps your dates. It files nothing.

Moniker uses the filings and dates you give it.

No clerk connection.Nothing is filed or looked up. You type from the stamped copy.
It keeps no content.A name and its dates. Nothing about your work.
It is not legal advice.Counties differ. Ask the clerk where you file.
It never touches a payment.One price, for software.

Pricing

One price, once

Less than one filing fee.

Most performers

Performer

$29 once

Every name you trade under.

  • Filing, publication and expiry
  • Confirm gate, no override
  • The 40-day clock on every change

One-time price. Your bank statement says Moniker Software. Your licence key is emailed to you within two working days of payment.

Checkout is our own bitcoin server, not a card processor — nobody we had to apply to and nobody who can close the account. The button takes you straight to it. Give your email address there — that is where your key is sent.

Questions

The ones we actually get asked

Do I need one for a stage name?

If you trade under it in California and it is not your legal name, usually yes. Ask the clerk or an adviser for your case.

What counts as a change?

A change in any fact in the statement — the address, the owners, the type of business. Record it, and Moniker counts the 40 days.

Is this legal advice?

No. It is the calendar and the check.

What do I actually get when I pay?

The demo on this page is the whole program, running on invented records. Paying gets you a licence key — one line of text, emailed to the address you give at checkout within two working days. Paste it into the program and from then on it keeps your own records. Until then, nothing you type into it is kept.

The key is checked inside the page, on your own machine. It never calls us, so there is still no account and nothing about your business goes anywhere. If you ever stop paying, your records stay exactly where they are, read-only, and Export still hands you every one of them.

Open the demo before the next contract

Velvet Hour is current. Starlight Studio’s publication started forty days after filing and ran three weeks. Ruby Lane Productions expired in June, and Night Owl Media’s move ended its statement in September.