[QUOTE=Napolean;12146810]You should drop the programmers name in here so noone else works with him, thats a very shady thing for a programmer to do. Its common sense that custom work is 99% of the time exclusive as well, which means.. you dont want copies for sale all over.

It's also bullshit that you financed the production of the software and that the programmer is now turning around and reselling it for even cheaper. Why did you have to pay more than everyone else? If he was going to resell it later he should have charged you retail as well.


Whenever I talk to programmers, they try to say I have to pay 40% more if I want to keep my ideas/software exclusive, not resold, or remade, plagarized, etc.

but I'm a push over for a lot of things and dont have the best connections. In the programming world, what is the STANDARD etiquette as far as innovative software ideas are concerned?

If you think of some revolutionary software and pay good rates to have it made, are you supposed to pay 40% extra to keep it private, even then they could still clone it and make a few changes to say they didnt copy you.

What is the main consensus moral wise in the programming community on this? I have like 10 programs ive never had made because I dont trust that it wont be resold or copied in some way unless I get in house programmers that sign their life away

Unless a full release is signed, the person who CREATES the work owns it and holds all copyrights to it.

The same goes for design. If I design a logo, I own that logo until otherwise stated by either a usage rights agreement or full release. This usually determines the price. I have designed many logos in the past that were only allowed to be used for signage, then the client wanted to make t-shirts & hats with the logo, they were required to pay me more for that, because the original price was based on the usage only being for the sign.

The circumstances in which a work is considered a work made for hire is determined by the language of the United States Copyright Act:

Works Made for Hire. -- (1) a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment; or (2) a work specially ordered or commissioned for use as a contribution to a collective work, as a part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, as a translation, as a supplementary work, as a compilation, as an instructional text, as a test, as answer material for a test, or as an atlas, f the parties expressly agree in a written instrument signed by them that the work shall be considered a work made for hire. 17 U.S.C. sec 101

I'm pretty sure that's exactly what I said, before Spacedog told us he was the expert.

Yes but does even a full release protect your software you contracted out from being slightly modified and then resold?

you'd need ke XPAYS legal team to truly protect contract for hire work wouldnt you?

I'm thinking the only way software you 'think of' would truly be safe is to hire someone inhouse, locally, via PAYROLL as your employee, AND make him sign NDA, non compete? and more papers probably.

Given how quickly the original poster here went from WTF to NP, I have to wonder if this is just a promo thread for a soon-to-be-released script.

Looks to me like Spacedog was half right. You would be the copy right holder if it were a work made for hire. This however does not appear to meet the standards as defined by 17 USC 101

A "work made for hire" is--

(1)
a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment; or

(2)
a work specially ordered or commissioned for use as a contribution to a collective work, as a part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, as a translation, as a supplementary work, as a compilation, as an instructional text, as a test, as answer material for a test, or as an atlas, if the parties expressly agree in a written instrument signed by them that the work shall be considered a work made for hire. For the purpose of the foregoing sentence, a "supplementary work" is a work prepared for publication as a secondary adjunct to a work by another author for the purpose of introducing, concluding, illustrating, explaining, revising, commenting upon, or assisting in the use of the other work, such as forewords, afterwords, pictorial illustrations, maps, charts, tables, editorial notes, musical arrangements, answer material for tests, bibliographies, appendixes, and indexes, and an "instructional text" is a literary, pictorial, or graphic work prepared for publication and with the purpose of use in systematic instructional activities.

In this case, the programmer was not an employee AND the work does not fall in to the defined scope of the second section. Specifically, this is software and NOT a work specially ordered or commissioned for use as a contribution to a collective work, as a part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, as a translation, as a supplementary work, as a compilation, as an instructional text, as a test, as answer material for a test, or as an atlas.

If you don't want a programmer to resell your work you have to get them to sign a Non-disclosure agreement. Otherwise expect it to be on the open market or sold privately.

You tell the programmers beforehand you dont want your ideas leaked or resold and if they wont honor that, move on. If the programmer agrees, get a NDA to be on the safe side if your ideas are valuable.

When I use to do client work, I would agree with my clients that if the software was for their personal use I would charge my usual fee. However if I was producing the software to be resold by THEM then I would charge extra or contract a cut of the sales.

You should never have to pay EXTRA to keep YOUR ideas your own. Thats my point of view anyways, it would be nice if most people thought the same way.

edit: bad timing

50 shady programmers :Oh crap

Wrong spacedog.

As a developer, unless specifically stated otherwise, I own the rights to code I create. period.

Now, I have some class, so I do not undercut my clients. If someone comes to me with a project and I develop it and in the end I have something I think could be a product I then go back to my client and say what do you think?

Sometimes the client does not want it distributed, in which case I say cool. In other cases, if they are for it, we split on the proceeds because, in all fairness, it is their idea we worked from.

But, the code is always mine if I designed and wrote it and I never give up my rights to my code. period. The client has license to use the code.

But, as people said earlier in the thread, a contract and ndas would have spelled out the rights and their would be no question at this point.

:thumbsup :thumbsup

This is complete bs, really.

You're right, NDAs should have been signed - but NDAs don't hold up in court. The fact of the matter is the guy is an arsehole.

I've had similar projects: you go to a programmer with ideas, they code them or suddenly feel like they're owed a percentage. Good programmers with ethics and social skills are hard to find.

Bodies 0f 9/11 victims used to fill potholes
 

whoops edit

of course i'm like wtf. i would have gladly payed an additional 40% on top of the cost for full rights to the script and i would have sold it myself if i knew this was the bullshit deal i was going to get stuck with.

i have not NP'd anything yet, i am still sour about it, but I have accepted the fact that this is going to pan out however the fuck it pans out. i'm still not naming any names inhopes that it won't go anywhere, but if it does don't think that i won't go throwing around copies of the script to anyone i already like. might as well....

the contract wouldn't mean anything as you don't really know who you signing the contract with. they could put any name down and then try to fight it cause he never sold it to you, but someone he has no idea who is did.
that's what happens when you deal with people sometimes i guess.
especially if it's not face to face cause if it was face to face, you know who you dealing with.
yes it would cost more to get the work done here but at least you know who you dealing with and if things go bad, you can always take them to court for breach of contract.

what the fuck is wrong with you saying bodies of 9/11 victims used to fill potholes.
you are one big fucken asshole.

That sucks.. You should try to get a %, what I would do.

Since we do NATS stuff, clients will come to us with a big head wanting a full custom project. Once we layout a 20-30k price tag, most back off. But what we have done is a build on project idea. You come in, pay $5k - get the $30k scripts and we add to it each time someone buys in, and everyone gets the upgrade.

Otherwise if someone is going to make money on your idea, get a %!

Well best way to avoid such problems is to create enterly new script with new code which do same thing.Of course then it still will be idea copy,but you cant prevent that unless you have patent on your idea.

define fair price, if someone wants a script from me exclusively i get an equity stake in the business for my coding. Otherwise it is just a licience.

As for what to do it depends on what rights you aquired for the script, if he assigned all rights send him a DCMA complient statement.

IF he gave you resell rights under cut him and take his business away from him.

if you only got operational rights your screwed take your lumps like a man

You should of come to an agreement with him beforehand.. seriously.

My company has done development work for large organisations and we always insist on keeping the intellectual property.

Code is covered by copyright law

according to the canadian copyright act (i am canadian so)

"13. (1) Subject to this Act, the author of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright therein. "


and

"(4) The owner of the copyright in any work may assign the right, either wholly or partially, and either generally or subject to limitations relating to territory, medium or sector of the market or other limitations relating to the scope of the assignment, and either for the whole term of the copyright or for any other part thereof, and may grant any interest in the right by licence, but no assignment or grant is valid unless it is in writing signed by the owner of the right in respect of which the assignment or grant is made, or by the owner?s duly authorized agent. "


the law does grant the employer first right of ownership

"Where the author of a work was in the employment of some other person under a contract of service or apprenticeship and the work was made in the course of his employment by that person, the person by whom the author was employed shall.

but contract of services (standard employment, with all required payments to government institutions-- UI, CPP , full complience with the employement act) is significantly different from contract for services (outsource contract)

i think he was making a thread but was in the wrong window.

dont be so harsh on jumping the gun there buddy.

as for the topic in hand, legally there is nothing wrong i dont think, but its pretty gay that it happens.

check my other posting. i apologized as i was brought to the attention of something in particular but he never made me or the rest of the board aware of it in advance when he posted that comment.

If you have nothing to do. don't do it here.

If the client comes up with the new and unique ideas behind the script, then the programmer has claim to only the code itself. That is, how the concept was implemented in general, the design... but not what the script actually does. The programmer may not be able to resell it to other clients.

Here is a similar real world analogy.

Let's say I come up with a new invention on paper, but I am totally clueless on how to build it. We'll say it's the first ever lampshade. So I walk into a factory and say, "My concept is to wrap some form of material around a lightbulb that attaches to the lamp with wire, make it happen." They design it's specific look and decide what materials to use.

Can they patent my idea just because they were the first ones to implement it into a working model? Absolutely not. Without a prior agreement, does that mean I can take their design and mass produce my idea in their form? Again, no.

There is only one concept, but there could be 10,000 different designs. So what we've got here is a script (one design) that the programmer owns, but he can't sell again because the client owns the concept. On the other hand if the client also wanted to resell the script (or make it freeware), he would need to have the programmer sign off all rights to his design of the concept (the code in this case).

The client could get a patent on his idea and then sue the programmer for resale profits he is making off it. I don't know if a patent is even needed. Maybe someone here knows for sure.

Actually if it was your concept and your script, it was a work for hire and you own the rights to it. If you were to patent the script, your name would be on the patent as it was your concept. :)

Let this be a lesson always have programmers sign NDA's etc.

Well did you sign a contract to give you exclusive rights yourself? It's like myself, when I do some custom work, I have a exclusive price (which is usually way, way more expensive) or a non-exclusive (I keep all the rights and can reuse or resale the product if I like). Of course when I do the resale it'll be cheaper than what I charged the person, but they should know that already.

That's my option I give to all of th people I work with. Exclusive or not, right from the get-go.

I was just gonna post that :thumbsup

It doesn't meet the requirments to qualify as a "work for hire" under the US copyright law definition of "work for hire". See earlier in thread.

god spacedog is a tool

I've talked to a few guys about building that exact same script. So it's not a overly unique idea. Main reason I never did it, is because of the same issue you are going through now.

I figured as soon as I paid to have it written they would turn around and release it themselves and I'd be SOL. My deal is I wanted the resale rights for the script I had written, so 9 times out of 10 if you go to a coder asking for that.. They will just take the idea and do it for themselves.

Back when I first started in this biz I talked to a programer about a idea I had. He tells me it would cost too much and he wasn't interested. About a year later this same guy is teamed up with another guy and they released a service that was loosely based on the idea I talked to him about.

Later this service was sold to another company for big money. So I learned my lesson about talking to people in this industry about ideas unless I know them well or trust them.

IMO your best bet is to always look outside the industry for any of this sort of programing, or best yet look locally. This will cut down the chances of them being able to steal your idea and market it, as they won't have a very good idea on who to market it to.

I would sue the living shit out of the guy, obviously if he's doing programming work for hire he obviously doesn't have much of a leg to stand on financially.

When he has to go hire a lawyer for $300+ an hour things will become very real all of a sudden.

Don't let this guy get away with this or he will be doing it to one of us next.

My 2 cents

DH

i am surprised how many people have gotten this so wrong

spacedog drinkingHARDEST you need to get new lawyers because they really don't know what they are talking about

And I am surprised how many people think this hinges on how you define work for hire. There was a unique idea behind this script, and it wasn't the programmer who conceived it. So this goes far beyond work for hire arguments.

Actually, not. A work for hire agreement would have resolved this.

Absent a work for hire agreement, the programmer owns the code and can do whatever he wants with it.

Does he have a website, maybe the work for hire is incorporated in something published on the site?

At any rate, you should disclose who this programmer is so that others do not fall victim to his shady business practices.

The issue here is not patent, it is copyright.

Yes, he could file for a patent on the idea, and maybe get issued a patent, and then 5 years from now and $100,000 later sue the programmer and spend another $100,000 to get a worthless judgment.

The problem here is that under the law, the programmer owns the copyright. A work for hire agreement would have resolved this. The relationship here is one of independent contractor, not employee, so there is no ownership of the rights by the guy who hired the programmer.

And will everyone stop saying NDA. NDA's have nothing to do with this.

It doesn't matter. Absent a work for hire agreement, or any other written contract, the programmer owns the code, period.