you pay for custom coding - 2 months later your script is avail retail! wtf? [drama]

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

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