Re: Ownership of work? -- MIDRANGE-NONTECH

The first question should be:- does the contract prohibit the employee from
working for a third party out of hours?
Followed by:- could there be a conflict of interest (eg. working for a
competitor) in the work being done?

If the work was done with any resource belonging to the employer in or out of
work hours then there may be some claim that the work belongs to the employer.
However if the work was done outside of the employers environment, out of hours
and with out any resource of the employer then the ownership stays with the
worker unless ownership has been signed over to another party.

Having said that though every circumstance can have its own interpretation in a
court of law, logic doesn't always prevail.
Laws also differ between countries.

Recently I saw a contractor given a task by a software house, without a written
contract identifying ownership, for a third party who also neglected a formal
association, as it turns out the author now claims the ownership and appears to
have won the battle.

I have been presented with a contract which stated that any code produced by me
became the property of the client. After pointing out that I was also contracted
to another client at the same time and that technically their clause was
unworkable it was changed to reflect that any code produced by me for them as
the client became their property. My personal view is that if I have written an
application for a client, the client owns that application. That doesn't mean I
can't use the same techniques in a different application.

Work Place Agreements and Contracts generally are a mine field at the best of
times, just because of the terminology used and it's interpretation.
Always take the time to read and understand the agreement and don't sign
anything until you are comfortable with your decision.

Another excellent Friday thread. :o)

Have a great weekend everyone,

Norm


----- Original Message -----
From: "David Gibbs" <david@midrange.com>
To: <midrange-jobs@midrange.com>; <midrange-nontech@midrange.com>
Sent: Friday, 14 December 2001 11:00
Subject: Ownership of work?


Folks:

Who owns the work?

Obviously, if programming is done on an employers time, using employers
resources (hardware, office space, software, etc), they own the code.

However ... what if a programmer does work on his own time, using his own
resources (say, an account on Netshare400) ... but it's code ... does the
employer have any claim on the resultant code?

A friend of mine is encountering this type of situation ... he was
presented with a new employment contract that states "Any software
developed while employed by xyz corp is the sole property of xyz corp" (or
something to that effect).

Ideas?

david
--
| Internet: david@midrange.com
| WWW: http://david.fallingrock.net
|
| Justice ... not vengeance

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