Mark Levy has written an article named “Who Owns Your Website? Unpleasant Surprise on the Internet“. In his writings, he describes many situations people find themselves in today. From copyrighted materials to the page creation, not all is as it seems. Even after paying or buying a domain/site, we may not necessarily own it.
In the case of music or media, the general rule of thumb is post, but do not share. This coincides with what Mark has to say. One may pay an author of a music piece or a banner of artwork, to post it and integrate it into our sites. However with the copyright acts, even though we have paid for the use, use is all we receive. Legally one cannot distribute (for download) to another group through their websites.
Although we have ownership over allowing other to hear the music or see the art, they cannot download it, but one still has slight ownership rights to that product. The real kicker is, who actually owns your site? This is where domain and contracts come into play.
When creating a site, a hassle is always present, which is why many private companies and business people provide their services to take what music, art and information you have and quickly convert it into a professional working website. Many times this “work” will cost a somewhat large amount of money and kick you in the rear.
Since you provided the money and resources (i.e. music and art), but they actually make the website… By law they are the legal owners of that website, of course different domain and service companyies may also put limitations on ones actual ownership of a site.
All in all, if you want to make your site your own, make sure to either create it yourself or add a clause into the contract bringing full ownership to yourself after completion of the job when possible. Remember that if you buy for the use of song or art, you are not given rights to distribute that medium for download. Lastly however if you are worried about it, just talk openly to those you are contracting out to create your new site.