20 ms·

An Email Thread Between a Developer and Gigster

821 points by mfts0 10y ago

dsr_ 10y ago
This is especially troubling since it appears that Gigster is directly aimed at software development, not generally connecting people with contract jobs. I wonder if they even have a lawyer familiar with software development on-board.
- mannykannot 10y ago
  >I wonder if they even have a lawyer familiar with software development on-board. I imagine they do, specifically so that they can own their developers to the greatest extent possible - see Uber etc. (and I am referring to Uber drivers, not developers.)
- jlgaddis 10y ago
  > I wonder if they even have a lawyer familiar with software development on-board. Sure they do -- and that same lawyer approved this agreement (if she didn't draft the whole thing for them) that is weighted entirely in favor of the company and their interests.
orian 10y ago
My first thought: WTF is gigster?
- OverThere 10y ago
  Me too
  - NDT 10y ago
    Part of YC S15
- gabrielricci 10y ago
  Had to Google it too!
- feiss 10y ago
  Yeah, I thought it was a new kind of hipster..
majewsky 10y ago
More training data for that bullshit detector that was on Show HN the other day.
therealmarv 10y ago
I recently learned from a github discussion that if you work for Amazon, Google etc. you are also not allowed to work on any open source projects, even on your free time without their permission.
- Gaessaki 10y ago
  Would it be possible to link that discussion?
  - therealmarv 10y ago
    sure no problem with that. Learned it here: https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner/issues/660#issuecomment-275594562 https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner/issues/660#issuecomment-... then googled about it (what irony) and then found out this is common practice at big tech companies in USA.
  - ominous 10y ago
    Interesting. This is from 2010, but random googling took me here: https://github.com/snapframework/snap-server/commit/5e4850d4cb74c75e706df509b90befc95263746a https://github.com/snapframework/snap-server/commit/5e4850d4... The situation is quite simple: - pre-existing work I contributed to this project remains under my copyright - contributions other people make to this project remain under their own copyrights - contributions I make to this project subsequent to November 2010 are under Google copyright - nobody should really give a shit about this because a) I freely agreed to this even though Google has a process where I could have asked to retain my own copyright because b) the code is BSD licensed and you can use it however you like regardless of who owns the copyright. ~ https://github.com/gregorycollins https://github.com/gregorycollins
    - uiri 10y ago
      This is correct with respect to Google's process. When it comes to Amazon, you have employees sending patches upstream anonymously because the company culture is against contributing anything back to the open source community.
joekrill 10y ago
Sounds like you dodged a bullet there. Thanks for sharing. Kind of ridiculous that they wouldn't even comment on the questions or clarify a bit! Not to mention the fact they basically ignored the first email and didn't respond until a follow-up was sent 2 weeks later? I mean, obviously I have no way of verifying the authenticity of any of this, so I'm just going to assume it's accurate. But in my experience this kind of behavior from companies is more common than it should be.
EgoIncarnate 10y ago
This type of thing is what first pushed me away from Gigster. It's like the overly broad employee invention assignments that a lot of companies want you to sign. No thank you.
justinsaccount 10y ago
Developer disagrees with terms. Reply is: > We have yet to have a disagreement (much less a legal battle) over the terms here. Ok then.
gurgus 10y ago
That classic "well, nobody else has had a problem, so you must be the problem" response. I remember at one of my first jobs, myself and another programmer were working on a side project (outside of work hours, not using company resources in any way) that were considering monetising. Our contracts stated that the company we worked for owned all of our code produced in and out of working hours. We got to the business end of the project and decided to consult our workplace to find out how strict they were on this. The conversation with HR went something like this: > Us: Oh hey there, can you clarify clauses X/Y/Z in our contracts regarding ownership of code. We are working on a project we are planning on monetising at some stage and we need to know if the company is going to do anything about this. Our project has no conflicts of interest and we haven't stolen any IP of the company. > HR: Oh... We've never had a question like this before... We can't say exactly. We'd have to consult our lawyers. > Us: Cool - can you consult them and let us know what they say, please? > HR: Sorry, we can't consult them as they charge by the minute and it's too expensive to warrant a conversation with them. > Us: So... you're not going to answer our question. > HR: Exactly. You'll have to do it at your own risk.
- paulcole 10y ago
  Just curious, what did the lawyer you consulted with say about it?
- owlninja 10y ago
  Is this common in contracts??
  - StavrosK 10y ago
    Yes, extremely.
  - zoner 10y ago
    I have it too. It would have been impossible to change, I was given a template contract and I do have side projects outside of my work. On the day I leave the job because my side project is making enough money, I would not be very nervous about it. How would they know? I also have something like "should not work in similar area within The UK". Again, how would they know? This conflicts with data protection act, therefore invalid.
hluska 10y ago
So, Gigster expects developers to sign an overly broad contract and yet they're not willing to answer any questions about that contract??? At best, that is a terrible way to treat developers. At worst, they just effectively guaranteed that only the most ignorant developers sign up with them. After all, the first thing I learned was to ask questions about every single ambiguous term in a contract. If this doesn't change, I don't see anything good in Gigster's future. Smart talent will leave, jobs will dry up and the whole platform will disappear.
willstepp 10y ago
I interviewed to be a Gigster about a year and a half ago, and was accepted, but the more I considered it and saw how gigs were distributed (at that time mostly via Slack messages) I got a bad feeling, like I was a dog in a pack, fighting over meat scraps. It was then I realized the gig economy is not all sunshine and roses. All that to say, this doesn't surprise me, that Gigster doesn't have its workers best interest at heart, anymore than Uber has its drivers best interest at heart.
- timdaniel 10y ago
  Yeah treat your supply like shit, this bullshit about the place to be for a developer, better meat scraps at Crew, Toptal, Hackerbay?
- skewart 10y ago
  They're even trying to replace their workers with automation in a similar way. See, for example, https://jobs.lever.co/gigster/19fc3d07-ba71-47d9-a77d-654c966de765 https://jobs.lever.co/gigster/19fc3d07-ba71-47d9-a77d-654c96...
- throwaway212017 10y ago
  It hasn't changed. Gigster PMs seem to be in charge of staffing projects, but the strategy for connecting developers with projects is vague. They seem to look for either people they have worked with before, or people who are active on Slack (so if you are, for example, an Android dev, the advice is to be active on the Android Slack channel). PMs as a group hoard information on projects: devs have almost no visibility into the current set of available, unstaffed gigs. Another issue I feel I should bring up: Gigster has problems paying out on time. The contract specifies net-15 terms for payout, but I've personally had a payment delayed for a month beyond that, with no visibility into why or what was going on. I often see complaints on Slack from others of payouts delayed that long, or longer.
  - omouse 10y ago
    PMs as a group hoard information on projects: devs have almost no visibility into the current set of available, unstaffed gigs. Their goal is to be remain necessary and collect a paycheck. They're middle-men and this is why I encourage devs to talk directly to clients and get used to solving client/customer/user problems through direct feedback rather than relying on the broken telephone system. Also this is when unions and co-operatives start to look like a good idea. If Gigster and other sites like it were operated as co-operatives, where every freelancer is also a member of the organization, they wouldn't be so inclined to hire middle-men and to rip people off.
dqv 10y ago
I'm not trying to defend gigster (broad indemnification clauses are bad news), but if someone framed those questions to me that way, I would also be hesitant to respond to them. It raises the "I'm going to be a handful" alarm. So, I understand why they were hesitant to respond and didn't want to comment on it.
- theli0nheart 10y ago
  I don't agree in the slightest. If anything, developers who ask questions are the ones you want most. One of the worst traits in a developer is the tendency to say yes to everything.
  - dajohnson89 10y ago
    Yeah, but there are thousands of devs who say yes to gigster. That's enough to make money.
    - theli0nheart 10y ago
      How do you know? Gigster has raised $10MM+. For a business that actually drives revenue (as opposed to Random Social iOS App), they have quite a long runway even if they lose a few thousand dollars per project.
  - dqv 10y ago
    >If anything, developers who ask questions are the ones you want most. One of the worst traits in a developer is the tendency to say yes to everything. I didn't say that. I said that I disagree with the way he framed his questions.
    - theli0nheart 10y ago
      Perhaps I'm missing something. Could you explain how the way he framed his questions was disagreeable to you? From my reading they were perfectly reasonable.
mooreds 10y ago
Horrifying. Always read your contracts and remember to abide by what you have signed, or don't sign at all. For companies, you all should be very clear on what your contract allows and doesn't allow. That will help everyone and allow folks to self select away from you if they need or want to. I understand the motivation of Gigster (own as much of the output of a developer as possible while at the same time pushing as much risk as possible to the developer), but agree that such spooky terms don't help attract talent. The only way to get rid of these kind of labor unfriendly terms in the current environment is to avoid them like the plague.
- HNaTTY 10y ago
  Publicly shaming Gigster like we're doing here should help.
TamDenholm 10y ago
I do contract work a lot in the UK through recruitment agencies. I very often provide feedback like this, especially when i'm asked to opt-out of the agency regulations. I never opt out, every single time i get the a response along the lines of "In my 20+ years of recruiting we've never had any problems with the contractor not opting out of the agency regulations, you're the first person to ever do that. Can i ask why you want to opt-in?" My response is always something like "Thank you for acknowledging my contribution to the innovation to the recruitment industry, i'm very proud to be a pioneer in this field, being first is a great honour. One thing to note, i'm not opting in, i'm refusing to opt out, i dont need to opt-in to the law. I've chosen to do this because theres no reason to and the law specifically protects me from you forcing me to do so. Also, since your client has already decided to hire me, even if i was to opt out, it wouldnt be recognised in court as the opt out paperwork must be signed before i ever meet the client." For this point on the agency regulations, i do it primarily just to make the recruiters work for their exorbitant markup on my day rate. However i do also question source code and copyright clauses like the author did, almost always, i'm looked at with dumbfoundment that i even bothered to read the contract. If anyone wants to know the regulations i'm referring to, heres a link: http://www.contractoruk.com/agencies/5158.html http://www.contractoruk.com/agencies/5158.html
- sanderjd 10y ago
  My question is: Does this ever actually result in them amending the contract? If not, do you then refuse to sign (as I suppose OP did in the gigster case)? If so, what happens if you discover that everyone's contracts are similarly problematic?
  - TamDenholm 10y ago
    Well given that the law specifically prohibits them from rescinding an offer if i dont want to opt out i gently remind them that if they try to pull any shit. Sometimes they'll just make the amend in the contract and that'll be the end of it, sometimes they want a reference for every single place i've worked at in the last 3 years (as a contractor thats probably about 20+ places), to which i tell them they'll get the standard 2 references and thats it, they also want verifications of every qualification i have, since i dont have a single qualification, only 12 years industry experience working for top names in the industry, that kinda solves itself. Basically i dont stand for their shit, but i'm in a very privileged position of never once been desperate to accept a position, its always been very easy for me to find work. So if i need to walk away, i will. Its those who dont have this option and will agree to any terms put in front of them i feel sorry for.
vayarajesh 10y ago
I recently got accepted in to the Gigster network and I haven't received any new "gigs". They seem to have poor process for onboarding a newbie in terms of allocating projects. Most of the projects require people with Karma more than "350+" or "321+" - whatever that odd number means - (the default karma is 300). With more than 500 developers and designers in the network it is becoming more and more difficult for newbies to get any sort of project. Because the number of projects are not flooding in as the new members of developers The probability keeps getting lower as new members join :|
utt 10y ago
Usually, if your side project make little or moderate money, no one cares. If your side project turn out to be Facebook, they might sue you to get a piece of your success.
StavrosK 10y ago
My standard reply to "oh we've never asked for someone's IP even though it's in the contract" is "great, then you won't mind me taking that term out, since you weren't using it anyway". Remember, if it's in the contract, it's what's happening. Let no amount of promises persuade you.
- ncallaway 10y ago
  This is a great response to almost any: "Oh, that's never come up, it's just in the contract" argument.
- koolba 10y ago
  I give a similar reply when being asked to remove an interest penalty clause for late payment. "We always pay our bills on time so there's no need for that!" "Great! In that case you don't have to worry about every paying it either so we'll leave it in!"
  - nraynaud 10y ago
    Here in France the minimal penalty rate is set by law, and it's mandatory to put it on every bill, with the payment terms now. It's part of a crackdown on big companies crushing the smaller ones with unreasonable payment times.
    - koolba 10y ago
      What's the min penalty? The usual one I add is something along the lines of: "Late payments shall accrue interest that is compounded 1.5% per month or the maximum amount allowed by law, whichever is less..."
      - nraynaud 10y ago
        So, the minimal interest rate is 2.79% (it looks like it's 3 times some kind of legal stuff). Interestingly enough, there is no VAT on it, but it's computed on the VAT price. The debt collection fee is 40€, It seems to be fixed in law, and not a minimum.
ekidd 10y ago
I've worked as a consultant for years. I occasionally employ a lawyer to review contracts with my clients. As a general rule of thumb, I'll only work for a client under one of three circumstances: 1. The client's standard contract is reasonable. This is rare. 2. The client's standard contract is unreasonable, but they're willing to cross-out or rewrite the objectionable bits before signing. This is very common. 3. It's worth everybody's time and money to get our respective lawyers involved. Hint: This will cost at least $1000 for each side, assuming 3 hours of legal time at roughly $300/hour. This sort of email thread is one of several reasons I wouldn't touch a site like Gigster with a 10-foot pole. If I can't renegotiate an unreasonable contract, I'm not a respected consultant, I'm probably an interchangeable body.[1] If you can't afford three hours of your lawyer's time, you can't afford me. The other reason why I wouldn't touch a site like Gigster is that those sites almost always turn into a race to the bottom for low-value jobs for the most difficult clients. It's OK to do a couple of those jobs when you're starting out—but once you've done real projects, your time is better spent networking to find new contacts. [1] I might make exceptions for very large and established organizations, for the right project and budget.
- danielweber 10y ago
  In my experience, it's very unusual for a company to simply state that it won't talk about it at all. I get one of these two patterns: 1. "Oh, okay, we see your point. We'll cross out clauses X and Y." 2. "Oh, thank you, we'll take this very seriously. Now we will have people talk at you for hours about why you can trust us and everyone else here was dumb enough to sign up."
  - dboreham 10y ago
    In my career I only had one case of #2. The person called me and said something like "if a partner isn't willing to sign agreement X, then we shouldn't be doing business with them". I said "ok" and hung up. An hour later that guy's bosses boss called me to apologize..
    - danielweber 10y ago
jheriko 10y ago
probably someone paid a lawyer to draw up, or copy-pasted that contract and then people who don't really care about their job to a serious level, or maybe just don't think very much, are saying it can't be changed - probably without even asking anyone who has authority to make that kind of decision. if you can get in touch with a director about this, and they are smart, they will probably want to fix this for everyone after about a moment's consideration.
donmatito 10y ago
"We never had a problem with this clause before, why would you want to change it?" Oh do I hate this line. But it's a two-way street. I'm very fortunate that for one of my first freelance gigs, I read the contract and specifically pointed out that I would be using personal/open sourced code snippets, and that I might want to reuse/open source some of the code I produced for them (only snippets with general interest). They agreed without a flinch, and thanks to that experience, I'm going to hold every other employer to the same standard "I never had a problem with this request with any other employer, why would you want to refuse?"
- danjoc 10y ago
  >I'm going to hold every other employer to the same standard "I never had a problem with this request with any other employer, why would you want to refuse?" I love that! I'm totally going with that next time :D Also, I'll probably throw in something like, "I'm surprised you say nobody else has mentioned it. This problem applies to anyone using open source code, which is basically everyone. Do you really want to hire developers who pay so little attention to details?"
ffef 10y ago
Another UpWork in the making...
dbg31415 10y ago
Legal Shit 101... if someone asks you to sign a contract, right away assume it's weighted in their favor. You have to read the contract before you sign it. Take your time, feel free to ask for a take-home copy and ask your lawyer to review it. Having asked a lot of people to sign contracts over the years... I'd say 90-95% don't read it and just sign where they are told to. Expedient... The contract template was written by the company's legal team to protect the company, it may have some terms in it that seem like they are an "agreement" (like how you'll get paid)... but really the goal is to keep the company safe. And, to be fair, I'd fire any lawyer who didn't give me a contract like that... so it's not the lawyer's fault. But if you sign it... you're agreeing to it. Easy solution: don't sign it. (But of course you presumably want the job.) Middle-ground solution: Read the contract, red-line / annotate things you have concerns / questions about, and ask if you can speak with legal. If it's a small business... they will probably weigh you comments against their lawyer's hourly cost... and more often than not just agree to let you cut things out of the contract. If it's a larger company... you're probably locked in if you want to work there -- that's just the reality of it. If you talk with legal, do your best to understand what their motivations are and make sure the contract is explicit. You can also ask for exceptions for side projects by simply declaring, "Any work done for side projects X, Y, Z shall not fall under the scope of this contract." Anyway look, it's a negotiation. You can test the limits, nothing is set in stone. You're the only one who is on your side. Everyone else is out to fuck you. Safe assumption.
ransom1538 10y ago
I get the whole 'this isn't fair argument.' But these contracts impact peoples livelihood so I will attempt to help. First, don't respond to HR with a complex set of legal questions. They wont know the answer and will push back -- corporate attorneys will charge astronomical amounts and these questions could even get the board involved -- which the CEO usually doesn't want to do. My suggestions: 1) The strike: Print the document, strike out what you don't want. Scan it, return it to the HR dept. with, "Hey cool signed!". Only do this if you are pretty senior. 2) The re-write: Take the document rewrite it, with the statements you don't like removed, then return it to HR with, "Hey cool signed!" 3) The 'it is coming!' (for junior guys): Take the email and delete it. Say you never got it. They will resend it, take it and place it into your spam folder, two weeks later say you never got it. Then reply back with your w9 two weeks later. Then if they complain reply with a w9 3 weeks later. Continue until you have clout then do 1 or 2.
- logfromblammo 10y ago
  Note that you can't do #2 if an officer of the company signs it first. But in my experience, documents like these don't even have a signature line for anyone other than you. So long as you are just unilaterally agreeing with yourself, you can agree to anything you like. You can write in that you're going to treat yourself to ice cream on the first Friday of every month! I wonder why companies even delude themselves into thinking such things are enforceable without a real, negotiated, two-party contract, with valuable consideration given by both sides. It's essentially just signing the document that says, "I have read the corporate handbook, including the company policy on X." If you violate the policy on X, their remedy is to dock your pay or fire you from the company. They can't lawfully enforce anything in court. (Which isn't to say that they won't ever win. The courts tend to favor those willing to pay the most to win.)
  - ransom1538 10y ago
    "Note that you can't do #2 if an officer of the company signs it first." NEVER EVER seen this. Hell. I have never seen two signatures on anything in 12 years. AND I always add "you're going to treat yourself to ice cream on the first Friday of every month!" -- obviously. The point is no one checks - HR just wants to thumbs up.
ryanmarsh 10y ago
I would like to see similar threads published for the contracts used by other work sites and even clients using standard Legal Zoom contracts. This stuff is important. I always say: If you haven't been fucked you haven't been in business very long.
soyiuz 10y ago
Have a contract that you draft that they counter sign. Set your own terms there. Any potential conflict would have to go through court in any case. Obviously not legal advice.
matthewcford 10y ago
> "does not contain any third-party software, including without limitation, “open source,” “copy left,” “public” or other similar code or anything derived from or based on any of the foregoing" This contract has probably been written by a lawyer who doesn't understands software development. I run digital agency and we've lost projects in the past that couldn't get past legal departments because they did not want us to use any open source software (or transfer the copyright to open source work)
ChuckMcM 10y ago
This is a great example of something people should always look for. Contracts can be very uneven with regard to the rights of the parties. And if you ask to balance one out and the other party refuses, walk away. They will screw you.
ben1040 10y ago
> does not contain any third-party software, including without limitation, “open source,” “copy left,” “public” or other similar code or anything derived from or based on any of the foregoing (unless approved by Gigster in writing) So is a Gigster developer contractually obligated to build everything from zero and take advantage of no OSS whatsoever? This seems like asking to handcuff your developers into writing terrible software by reinventing the wheel. Or do they have some additional "in-writing" approval document that specifies acceptable OSS licenses? Several companies I've worked for had lists of OSS licenses that were reviewed and approved by general counsel as acceptable (pretty much the list boiled down to BSD, MIT, Apache). Then again it seems like if that were the case, the sensible approach would be to write the contract such that using open source software is acceptable, so long as it is offered under a license that appears on an approved list and does not obligate the release of the entire project's source code.
- danielweber 10y ago
  As bad as I think Gigster's agreement is, this clause is a good place to start from. It means that they don't have someone shoving GPL code into a project that must remain closed source.
wyc 10y ago
Another touchy issue is non-competes after employment, meaning that "you can't work for anyone else or hire our employees." States such as CA are very much against anything that restricts someone's ability to engage in free trade, especially when the restrictions apply post-employment. Imagine how ridiculous it would be to ask this of independent contractors, whose roles are defined by that they engage with multiple clients at once and have looser associations--that is, they are independent. Yet I see a lot of CA contracts for independents hold this clause, and even argue for its fairness. From the BAR[1]: Not only are non-compete covenants void in California, but an employer may be liable in tort for wrongful termination if it fires an employee who refuses to sign an employment agreement that contains an unenforceable covenant not to compete. D’Sa v. Playhut, Inc., 85 Cal. App. 4th 927 (Cal. Ct. App. 2000). This rule holds even if the agreement contains a choiceof-law or severability provision. Id. at 934. The concern is that the presence of an unenforceable non-compete covenant in an employment agreement may have an undesirable deterrent effect on employees who do not know their rights under California law. “[I]t is not likely that [the defendant’s] employees are sufficiently versed in California’s law of contracts such that they would know (1) that the covenant not to compete is invalid and therefore not enforceable by [the defendant] and (2) that they could sign the agreement without fear they would be bound by the covenant not to compete.” Id Read your contracts. Get attorney review and specifically ask about the parts that make you uncomfortable. If you're planning to make $XX,000 or more from this engagement, isn't it worth the $100-$300 for the guarantee? [1] https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/events/labor_law/2013/03/employment_rightsresponsibilitiescommitteemidwintermeeting/4_orrick.authcheckdam.pdf https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/events/labor_law...
ascendantlogic 10y ago
The contracts I have when working with clients specifically mention type A and type B deliverables. One being "secret sauce" IP that the company owns and the other being general development tools and practices that I own and grant a perpetual license to the company to use.
sixtypoundhound 10y ago
Ahh.... sounds like the script for a future Hollywood movie: "How to Lose a Talented Developer in 10 Seconds"
gargarplex 10y ago
Hi. If any developers want a rundown on legal ideas (good explanations of "indemnification", "representations and warranties", etc.), we offer that in our book, Code For Cash. (https://www.breakingintoconsulting.com https://www.breakingintoconsulting.com) Peter Krumins said, "The legal stuff is excellent. I was always afraid of that and spent many thousands of dollars on various lawyers to make a good agreement, and there were no good guides about what the terms such as 'indemnification' mean. That is really well explained." That's because the Legal Ideas chapter was written by a business attorney from Silicon Valley who has worked on both sides of the table. If you sign up for our mailing list, you get the entire Legal Ideas chapter for free during day 2 or day 3 of the autoresponder campaign. You may also purchase the entire book for a severe discount by using the HN-only link in my profile.
- jlgaddis 10y ago
  unsubscribe
  - gargarplex 10y ago
    Thanks. You have been successfully removed from our mailing list.
sidchilling 10y ago
This is not just for contracts. Gigster does that even when recruiting. After three rounds of interview, I got a canned response that they are unable to take my application forward. I asked them for feedback and got the same reply that they can't provide any feedback (even after 3 rounds of interviews). I reached out to the developer who interviewed me and after a couple of days, he replied back saying that Gigster doesn't allow him to provide any feedback! Avoid interviewing with them, in my opinion.
- Clanan 10y ago
  This is true of practically every company. It's a liability issue - companies are afraid that feedback will be used in a lawsuit, so their favored course of action is to say nothing.
pbnjay 10y ago
I did a pre-screening with toptal and literally had these same questions... And they basically had the same responses. No thanks! I understand especially with the race to the bottom they'll always have someone new enough to sign these types of agreements, but everyone I know with experience or seniority avoids the platforms because of how ludicrous these restrictions are.
levlandau 10y ago
Cofounder here. Really appreciate the discussion and all of the feedback. The spirit of the contract's never been intended to be unreasonably restrictive -- though I totally understand the concern. We wanted to include certain terms since as part of our model, we do own the code written specifically for Gigster projects. We certainly don't want to own code folks write outside of Gigster projects. We've received very similar feedback recently and were going to do a review of the contract with our lawyers highlighting this specific issue. We'll also consider adding an FAQ around any contract nuances. We care about doing what is fair and while a lot of terms here are standard we'll try to review terms to make our position much clearer. Will share important updates. Thanks
- adekok 10y ago
  > we do own the code written specifically for Gigster projects. That's good. > We certainly don't want to own code folks write outside of Gigster projects. That's good. But the contract apparently says something else. This reminds me of a contract gig I had a while ago. I asked them similar questions about their contract, and they said "that's not what we intend to do". OK... so could they update the contract to state their real intentions? A: No. OK. I don't need the work that badly. If the contract starts with bad terms and them lying to me, there isn't much reason to move forward.
  - BinaryIdiot 10y ago
    I mean, what would you like them to do? They're aware of it (and this thread obviously shined a brighter light on it) and are going to go over it with their lawyers. Isn't that reasonable? Contract changes don't exactly come quickly especially with expensive lawyers involved. I'm just not sure what you would like them to do about it right now.
    - adekok 10y ago
      > I'm just not sure what you would like them to do about it right now. The point is that when the contractor asked for changes, he got told to go stuff himself. It's only when there's larger publicity that they suggested the contract can change. And, TBH, it's ridiculous to construe my argument as they have to change right now. They were asked to change, and they refused. That's a problem. What part of that do you not understand?
logicallee 10y ago
Hey, I thought their answer was absolutely great!!! My thinking, reading ONLY the dev's original email, was the same as what they wrote: then I read their reply and found their phrasing MUCH better. Here's all you would have gotten from me: ------------------------------------ answer email I would have written ------------------------------ >Some questions I have about with this contract: (allowed for by section 11.5): >>"including source code developed by Contractor ... generally applicable to other Customer projects" We do not claim the source code for work you do that is unrelated to and not used by your work for us. If you develop some tooling that is general but used in the project, you have to assign rights. If you can't assign rights (for example it's open-source) don't use it. Use only new code that you develop and assign over to us fully. >"Contractor agrees to indemnify Gigster from any and all claims, damages, liability, settlement, attorneys’ fees and expenses, as incurred, on account of the foregoing or any breach of this agreement" Your reading is correct and we have absolutely no desire to appear in court for any reason. You waive all your rights to sue us. If you do want to sue someone, you will have to go work for a big company and go sue them, they will be happy to appear any number of times to dispute anything you want. We are not going to change that language. That said we haven't had disagreements and don't intend to have any - we rely on you, after all. Put another way, we pay you more instead of taking that money and paying some lawyers to go argue with you. (This clause specifically prevents frivolous lawsuits - I want to reiterate that we don't have disputes with our developers. You can go talk to them and see how they are treated.) >>"does not contain any third-party software, including without limitation, “open source,” “copy left,” “public” or other similar code or anything derived from or based on any of the foregoing" >So I can't derive code from examples from django or flask documentation, cited stack overflow snippets, etc. etc. in my work? I'm not sure that would be a very effective way to operate. There is nothing stopping Django from suing anyone using any of the source code they have included in their documentation. Copyleft is even stronger and our clients would be bound to freely make available the complete source code used by anything. My suggestion is to learn to program, by reading documentation, and then simply code your own solutions. Likewise you can certainly peruse Stack Overflow for inspiration. I will add that as a general rule we are not concerned about software patents, so that you do not have to be concerned about your "inspiration" leading you to use a technique whose implementation is generally protected (no matter what specific source code implements it). However, as legal advice, please don't actively seek out patent status (willful infringement is a multiplier on damages) and if you do learn of a software patent affecting an algorithm you wish to use, seek an alternative. We've literally never had an issue with licensing. So to summarize: by all means, read other people's code to learn a language. Read other people's responses on stack overflow and in documentation to learn specific approaches. By all means learn to program, from any source you want. Write your own code and assign it to your clients. I hope this helps answer your questions as well as tell you some of our thinking. Our developers are treated very well. Let me know if there's anything else I can tell you or if you have any other questions! " ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ that's literally what I would have said. There's nothing that needs clarification or change and the language the original dev quoted is incredibly clear and perfectly fair. But, man, their response is even better. It says the same thing - but so much better. (Actually I lied - I wouldn't have thought of saying they treat developers really well -- so I included that part in my statement of what I would have written, even though I wouldn't have written it.) In all this is awesome work by them : ) I don't have any disclaimer to make - no relation to the dev or Gigster. -- EDIT: I got downvoted but their response is still absolutely fine.
ABCLAW 10y ago
There is a lot of legal misinformation in this thread, as is common on HN, both on the substance and practice-in-fact. For readers in a similar contractual pickle, take things read here with a grain of salt. Most assume very specific things about your information and bargaining position which may not apply. In general, the applicability and effect of broad catch-all employment agreement's clauses will vary between jurisdictions - This is part of why they're drafted in a hyper-defensive manner. No small business is going to shell out for legal to obtain 300+ jurisdiction specific form agreements. There may be very clear bright-line rules dealing with your issues as raised which put you in the clear, but you won't know unless you consult an expert. Because of the nature of the employment bar, you can get straightforward accurate advice for very little investment - if you approach obtaining advice properly. Take the time to draft an email to local employment counsel setting out your concerns, attaching the proposed agreement and setting out the scope of review you would like him to perform. Ask for a quote. Repeat until you find a good fit.
goldfishcaura 10y ago
So I hate to disappoint everyone. Such contract really cannot be viewed the way this was summarized through an email. One paragraph has to be interpreted in the context of everything else. Moreover, everyone uses this language. It is funny, but I suspect that most of Silicon Valley just recycles the same 3-4 contracts, that individual lawyers just modify slightly. I have now worked with 60+ tech companies (Looker, Gigster, Strava, etc) - with 15 of them I had to look over the verbiage on my own. With a first couple, I was just as suspicious. But after discussing with lawyers, I learned that there are two major issues: 1) not everything put in the contract is enforceable. In fact, just because all lawyers recycle the same contract, does not make it more enforceable. It is a simple leverage in bullying that lawyers depend on, should something occur 2) individual paragraphs have to be interpreted in the context of the entire engagement. In other words, did you have have access to Client's data on other projects. Yes, then you bet, your IP rights should be waived as they pertain to those projects. Bottom line, relax and focus on good faith.
- ghurtado 10y ago
  > Bottom line, relax and focus on good faith. That is quite possibly the WORST legal advice that I've ever heard with regards to contract law (and you're in very tough competition here)
- cuspycode 10y ago
  Anything not enforceable shouldn't be in the contract in the first place. The only purpose of contracts is to enforce earlier promises when people don't agree anymore.
scottbcovert 10y ago
I joined Gigster mid-November 2016 and had similar concerns as the OP regarding specific clauses of the contract. This is definitely a tough situation for a developer going through onboarding-personally I wanted the first impression I left to be that I'm a "team player," as opposed to starting a legal battle on day one. Unfortunately, these interactions always seem to favor companies over individuals. People in general don't enjoy bickering over legalese so individuals don't want to ruffle feathers by pushing back, while company employees are able to take cover under the umbrella that they're just following policy. Truthfully though, it is most often companies-not prospective employees-that initiate legal discussions by presenting contracts and individuals should feel justified in verbalizing any concerns they have. I think this is possible while still remaining professional and courteous. The first thing I did was look to Google to see if any other developers in the past had similar concerns as me, which brought me to this Quora post - https://www.quora.com/Is-the-contract-for-Gigster-reasonable-for-the-developer https://www.quora.com/Is-the-contract-for-Gigster-reasonable... Richard's response was helpful and thorough (if you're reading this, thank you!) and although he had additional issues with the contract, my main concern was with sections 2.1 and 2.2 (assignment of IP to Gigster for work not specific to the customer and the exemption of pre-existing IP from being assigned to Gigster including only that which is explicitly outlined, respectively). I actually discussed the contract language with my family and got some good advice from both my father and brother. They agreed I was within my right to voice my concerns so long as I did it in a productive way. For example, instead of presenting problems by just stating language I didn't like they told me it would be better to provide solutions in my response by offering amendments that I would feel comfortable with. To this point I had interacted with three individuals: 1. The person who had reached out to me about joining Gigster 2. The individual that emailed me the DocuSign link containing the contract and 3. The individual that sent me a (possibly automated) response after my application was submitted to their website. Let's call these individuals Peter, Paul, & Mary. I emailed my concerns to Paul and Mary, not knowing which would be better to handle this sort of thing. I received word back from Mary saying that Paul was more familiar with the contract so she'd let him handle it. After two days I received an email from Peter asking for an update on my onboarding process. I explained that I had emailed Paul about the contract and hadn't received word back but that I'd ping him again. Peter told me he would also follow up through other channels. I never did get a response from Paul personally, but after another two days I received word from Peter that he had spoken with Paul and the Gigster legal team and was wondering if I could hop on the phone. Peter was very open to my concerns and explained the reasoning behind the contract language. I said that I understood, but that admittedly I still took issue with it. Peter seemed to understand and honestly that was pretty much that. He offered to share a Google Doc with me so I could highlight/tweak language I was uncomfortable with and afterwards the contract was promptly signed by both parties. I also reached out internally to Peter, Paul, and Mary over slack before making this post so they could have a heads up. Paul explained to me that he was not really involved with the Gigster contract or its hiring policies, just that his role involved setting up the onboarding tools and this automatically attached his email to a lot of the communications; which would explain the lack of responses I saw. Paul told me he was “neither encouraging nor discouraging [me] from posting,” but Peter and Mary responded in support of me posting my experience to HN, which I thought was pretty cool. For future reference here is a portion of my email to Gigster containing the changes I requested, which were accommodated: I am a little uncomfortable with some of the language in sections 2.1 & 2.2 and was hoping we could revise: a. Section 2.1 assigns ownership to Gigster not only of all Deliverables, which makes total sense, but also of all source code "including but not limited to source code developed or created by Contractor that is not specific to Customer and is generally applicable to other Customer projects and deliverables ("Community Code")." This language seems quite broad and what constitutes "Community Code" seems a bit difficult to define; I'd prefer to remove the last part of this sentence so the section instead reads "...or any Confidential Information (as defined below) (collectively, “Inventions”). Contractor hereby makes all.." b. Section 2.2 exempts any of my pre-existing IP from being assigned ownership to Gigster, but then seems to require all such pre-existing IP be disclosed in writing. This seems difficult and probably unnecessary so I'd like to remove "in each case ((a) and (b)) that are expressly set forth in writing to Gigster prior to delivery of the Deliverables to Gigster." and just end the sentence after "any intellectual property rights therein."
RainManDetroit 10y ago
Reminds me of when I was outright sued over a YouTube video on my channel - twice. It doesn't matter how many "thousands of successful milestones and payments without issues with the terms," there is a vital flaw (in their favor) with said contract. Contracts are easily done on a case-by-case basis, and dubious clauses are routinely renegotiated. All of this is irrelevant however when even the lawyers won't answer a simple contract law question. I won both of the suits mentioned above by proving their position to be indefensible. Which I believe you have done. Keep your integrity, your current and future clients will recognize it.
RainManDetroit 10y ago
P.S. It would be interesting what stance they would take to you being named as co-owners of any IP developed, and royalties paid for any further use beyond current project. My brother is a mechanical engineer and original designs in his lab always have him as a registered patent holder.
20years 10y ago
"We have yet to have a disagreement (much less a legal battle) over the terms here. We have completed thousands of successful milestones and payments without issues with the terms and we unfortunately cannot adjust them on a case by case basis." Note to self: Don't hire Gigster developers. If a dev does not pay attention to this kind of stuff or thinks it's okay, I don't feel all that comfortable having them work on my projects.
jtchang 10y ago
Good to know Gigster really doesn't care about the developer. Will let my friends know not use it.
apercu 10y ago
If you can clearly demonstrate that you are not competing with your employer, using their IP, working on their time, using their equipment then these types of non-competes should be null and void. And yes, I quit a job over that kind of contract. If I invent something on my time it's mine.
rajacombinator 10y ago
Yikes. Just applied to gigster the other day. This thread has definitely made me reconsider.
baseh 10y ago
From their website (homepage): > Gigster is a smart software development service, combining top developers and designers with artificial intelligence. Am I the only one who does not understand what that even means? Do they bring together matching developers and designers using their artificial intelligent algorithms or the developers and designers they hire have artificial intelligence?
xiaoma 10y ago
After seeing this, I have zero respect for gigster or anyone who empowers this behavior. They're asking for unilateral power to end the software career of any of their contractors, even decades into the future. Worse still, the demand their contractors to sign away any legal right to recourse... And in exchange they offer mediocre contracting work. Screw those guys.
chrisbennet 10y ago
A contract needs a couple of things in order to be valid: 1. A meeting of minds i.e. both parties agree on something. 2. Consideration; usually money. (This is why you sometimes see donated things sold for a dollar.) When faced with signing a new contract that asks for more of something, I'd recommend asking for consideration of some sort. (1) "Oh, new contract? Let's talk about my new salary." (1) At least if you're an in-demand software developer.
- danielweber 10y ago
  Continued employment counts as consideration in many states.
  - chrisbennet 10y ago
    The old "I won't beat you up if you stop seeing my sister." "consideration". But you make a good point that I wasn't aware of. That's why it only works if you're in a field like software development where you have some leverage.

821 points by mfts0 10y ago

dsr_ 10y ago

This is especially troubling since it appears that Gigster is directly aimed at software development, not generally connecting people with contract jobs. I wonder if they even have a lawyer familiar with software development on-board.

mannykannot 10y ago
>I wonder if they even have a lawyer familiar with software development on-board. I imagine they do, specifically so that they can own their developers to the greatest extent possible - see Uber etc. (and I am referring to Uber drivers, not developers.)
jlgaddis 10y ago
> I wonder if they even have a lawyer familiar with software development on-board. Sure they do -- and that same lawyer approved this agreement (if she didn't draft the whole thing for them) that is weighted entirely in favor of the company and their interests.

orian 10y ago

My first thought: WTF is gigster?

OverThere 10y ago
Me too
- NDT 10y ago
  Part of YC S15
gabrielricci 10y ago
Had to Google it too!
feiss 10y ago
Yeah, I thought it was a new kind of hipster..

majewsky 10y ago

More training data for that bullshit detector that was on Show HN the other day.

therealmarv 10y ago

I recently learned from a github discussion that if you work for Amazon, Google etc. you are also not allowed to work on any open source projects, even on your free time without their permission.

Gaessaki 10y ago
Would it be possible to link that discussion?
- therealmarv 10y ago
  sure no problem with that. Learned it here: https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner/issues/660#issuecomment-275594562 https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner/issues/660#issuecomment-... then googled about it (what irony) and then found out this is common practice at big tech companies in USA.
- ominous 10y ago
  Interesting. This is from 2010, but random googling took me here: https://github.com/snapframework/snap-server/commit/5e4850d4cb74c75e706df509b90befc95263746a https://github.com/snapframework/snap-server/commit/5e4850d4... The situation is quite simple: - pre-existing work I contributed to this project remains under my copyright - contributions other people make to this project remain under their own copyrights - contributions I make to this project subsequent to November 2010 are under Google copyright - nobody should really give a shit about this because a) I freely agreed to this even though Google has a process where I could have asked to retain my own copyright because b) the code is BSD licensed and you can use it however you like regardless of who owns the copyright. ~ https://github.com/gregorycollins https://github.com/gregorycollins
  - uiri 10y ago
    This is correct with respect to Google's process. When it comes to Amazon, you have employees sending patches upstream anonymously because the company culture is against contributing anything back to the open source community.

joekrill 10y ago

Sounds like you dodged a bullet there. Thanks for sharing. Kind of ridiculous that they wouldn't even comment on the questions or clarify a bit! Not to mention the fact they basically ignored the first email and didn't respond until a follow-up was sent 2 weeks later? I mean, obviously I have no way of verifying the authenticity of any of this, so I'm just going to assume it's accurate. But in my experience this kind of behavior from companies is more common than it should be.

EgoIncarnate 10y ago

This type of thing is what first pushed me away from Gigster. It's like the overly broad employee invention assignments that a lot of companies want you to sign. No thank you.

justinsaccount 10y ago

Developer disagrees with terms. Reply is: > We have yet to have a disagreement (much less a legal battle) over the terms here. Ok then.

gurgus 10y ago

That classic "well, nobody else has had a problem, so you must be the problem" response. I remember at one of my first jobs, myself and another programmer were working on a side project (outside of work hours, not using company resources in any way) that were considering monetising. Our contracts stated that the company we worked for owned all of our code produced in and out of working hours. We got to the business end of the project and decided to consult our workplace to find out how strict they were on this. The conversation with HR went something like this: > Us: Oh hey there, can you clarify clauses X/Y/Z in our contracts regarding ownership of code. We are working on a project we are planning on monetising at some stage and we need to know if the company is going to do anything about this. Our project has no conflicts of interest and we haven't stolen any IP of the company. > HR: Oh... We've never had a question like this before... We can't say exactly. We'd have to consult our lawyers. > Us: Cool - can you consult them and let us know what they say, please? > HR: Sorry, we can't consult them as they charge by the minute and it's too expensive to warrant a conversation with them. > Us: So... you're not going to answer our question. > HR: Exactly. You'll have to do it at your own risk.

paulcole 10y ago
Just curious, what did the lawyer you consulted with say about it?
owlninja 10y ago
Is this common in contracts??
- StavrosK 10y ago
  Yes, extremely.
- zoner 10y ago
  I have it too. It would have been impossible to change, I was given a template contract and I do have side projects outside of my work. On the day I leave the job because my side project is making enough money, I would not be very nervous about it. How would they know? I also have something like "should not work in similar area within The UK". Again, how would they know? This conflicts with data protection act, therefore invalid.

hluska 10y ago

So, Gigster expects developers to sign an overly broad contract and yet they're not willing to answer any questions about that contract??? At best, that is a terrible way to treat developers. At worst, they just effectively guaranteed that only the most ignorant developers sign up with them. After all, the first thing I learned was to ask questions about every single ambiguous term in a contract. If this doesn't change, I don't see anything good in Gigster's future. Smart talent will leave, jobs will dry up and the whole platform will disappear.

willstepp 10y ago

I interviewed to be a Gigster about a year and a half ago, and was accepted, but the more I considered it and saw how gigs were distributed (at that time mostly via Slack messages) I got a bad feeling, like I was a dog in a pack, fighting over meat scraps. It was then I realized the gig economy is not all sunshine and roses. All that to say, this doesn't surprise me, that Gigster doesn't have its workers best interest at heart, anymore than Uber has its drivers best interest at heart.

timdaniel 10y ago
Yeah treat your supply like shit, this bullshit about the place to be for a developer, better meat scraps at Crew, Toptal, Hackerbay?
skewart 10y ago
They're even trying to replace their workers with automation in a similar way. See, for example, https://jobs.lever.co/gigster/19fc3d07-ba71-47d9-a77d-654c966de765 https://jobs.lever.co/gigster/19fc3d07-ba71-47d9-a77d-654c96...
throwaway212017 10y ago
It hasn't changed. Gigster PMs seem to be in charge of staffing projects, but the strategy for connecting developers with projects is vague. They seem to look for either people they have worked with before, or people who are active on Slack (so if you are, for example, an Android dev, the advice is to be active on the Android Slack channel). PMs as a group hoard information on projects: devs have almost no visibility into the current set of available, unstaffed gigs. Another issue I feel I should bring up: Gigster has problems paying out on time. The contract specifies net-15 terms for payout, but I've personally had a payment delayed for a month beyond that, with no visibility into why or what was going on. I often see complaints on Slack from others of payouts delayed that long, or longer.
- omouse 10y ago
  PMs as a group hoard information on projects: devs have almost no visibility into the current set of available, unstaffed gigs. Their goal is to be remain necessary and collect a paycheck. They're middle-men and this is why I encourage devs to talk directly to clients and get used to solving client/customer/user problems through direct feedback rather than relying on the broken telephone system. Also this is when unions and co-operatives start to look like a good idea. If Gigster and other sites like it were operated as co-operatives, where every freelancer is also a member of the organization, they wouldn't be so inclined to hire middle-men and to rip people off.

dqv 10y ago

I'm not trying to defend gigster (broad indemnification clauses are bad news), but if someone framed those questions to me that way, I would also be hesitant to respond to them. It raises the "I'm going to be a handful" alarm. So, I understand why they were hesitant to respond and didn't want to comment on it.

theli0nheart 10y ago
I don't agree in the slightest. If anything, developers who ask questions are the ones you want most. One of the worst traits in a developer is the tendency to say yes to everything.
- dajohnson89 10y ago
  Yeah, but there are thousands of devs who say yes to gigster. That's enough to make money.
  - theli0nheart 10y ago
    How do you know? Gigster has raised $10MM+. For a business that actually drives revenue (as opposed to Random Social iOS App), they have quite a long runway even if they lose a few thousand dollars per project.
- dqv 10y ago
  >If anything, developers who ask questions are the ones you want most. One of the worst traits in a developer is the tendency to say yes to everything. I didn't say that. I said that I disagree with the way he framed his questions.
  - theli0nheart 10y ago
    Perhaps I'm missing something. Could you explain how the way he framed his questions was disagreeable to you? From my reading they were perfectly reasonable.

mooreds 10y ago

Horrifying. Always read your contracts and remember to abide by what you have signed, or don't sign at all. For companies, you all should be very clear on what your contract allows and doesn't allow. That will help everyone and allow folks to self select away from you if they need or want to. I understand the motivation of Gigster (own as much of the output of a developer as possible while at the same time pushing as much risk as possible to the developer), but agree that such spooky terms don't help attract talent. The only way to get rid of these kind of labor unfriendly terms in the current environment is to avoid them like the plague.

HNaTTY 10y ago
Publicly shaming Gigster like we're doing here should help.

TamDenholm 10y ago

I do contract work a lot in the UK through recruitment agencies. I very often provide feedback like this, especially when i'm asked to opt-out of the agency regulations. I never opt out, every single time i get the a response along the lines of "In my 20+ years of recruiting we've never had any problems with the contractor not opting out of the agency regulations, you're the first person to ever do that. Can i ask why you want to opt-in?" My response is always something like "Thank you for acknowledging my contribution to the innovation to the recruitment industry, i'm very proud to be a pioneer in this field, being first is a great honour. One thing to note, i'm not opting in, i'm refusing to opt out, i dont need to opt-in to the law. I've chosen to do this because theres no reason to and the law specifically protects me from you forcing me to do so. Also, since your client has already decided to hire me, even if i was to opt out, it wouldnt be recognised in court as the opt out paperwork must be signed before i ever meet the client." For this point on the agency regulations, i do it primarily just to make the recruiters work for their exorbitant markup on my day rate. However i do also question source code and copyright clauses like the author did, almost always, i'm looked at with dumbfoundment that i even bothered to read the contract. If anyone wants to know the regulations i'm referring to, heres a link: http://www.contractoruk.com/agencies/5158.html http://www.contractoruk.com/agencies/5158.html

sanderjd 10y ago
My question is: Does this ever actually result in them amending the contract? If not, do you then refuse to sign (as I suppose OP did in the gigster case)? If so, what happens if you discover that everyone's contracts are similarly problematic?
- TamDenholm 10y ago
  Well given that the law specifically prohibits them from rescinding an offer if i dont want to opt out i gently remind them that if they try to pull any shit. Sometimes they'll just make the amend in the contract and that'll be the end of it, sometimes they want a reference for every single place i've worked at in the last 3 years (as a contractor thats probably about 20+ places), to which i tell them they'll get the standard 2 references and thats it, they also want verifications of every qualification i have, since i dont have a single qualification, only 12 years industry experience working for top names in the industry, that kinda solves itself. Basically i dont stand for their shit, but i'm in a very privileged position of never once been desperate to accept a position, its always been very easy for me to find work. So if i need to walk away, i will. Its those who dont have this option and will agree to any terms put in front of them i feel sorry for.

vayarajesh 10y ago

I recently got accepted in to the Gigster network and I haven't received any new "gigs". They seem to have poor process for onboarding a newbie in terms of allocating projects. Most of the projects require people with Karma more than "350+" or "321+" - whatever that odd number means - (the default karma is 300). With more than 500 developers and designers in the network it is becoming more and more difficult for newbies to get any sort of project. Because the number of projects are not flooding in as the new members of developers The probability keeps getting lower as new members join :|

utt 10y ago

Usually, if your side project make little or moderate money, no one cares. If your side project turn out to be Facebook, they might sue you to get a piece of your success.

StavrosK 10y ago

My standard reply to "oh we've never asked for someone's IP even though it's in the contract" is "great, then you won't mind me taking that term out, since you weren't using it anyway". Remember, if it's in the contract, it's what's happening. Let no amount of promises persuade you.

ncallaway 10y ago
This is a great response to almost any: "Oh, that's never come up, it's just in the contract" argument.
koolba 10y ago
I give a similar reply when being asked to remove an interest penalty clause for late payment. "We always pay our bills on time so there's no need for that!" "Great! In that case you don't have to worry about every paying it either so we'll leave it in!"
- nraynaud 10y ago
  Here in France the minimal penalty rate is set by law, and it's mandatory to put it on every bill, with the payment terms now. It's part of a crackdown on big companies crushing the smaller ones with unreasonable payment times.
  - koolba 10y ago
    What's the min penalty? The usual one I add is something along the lines of: "Late payments shall accrue interest that is compounded 1.5% per month or the maximum amount allowed by law, whichever is less..."
    - nraynaud 10y ago
      So, the minimal interest rate is 2.79% (it looks like it's 3 times some kind of legal stuff). Interestingly enough, there is no VAT on it, but it's computed on the VAT price. The debt collection fee is 40€, It seems to be fixed in law, and not a minimum.

ekidd 10y ago

I've worked as a consultant for years. I occasionally employ a lawyer to review contracts with my clients. As a general rule of thumb, I'll only work for a client under one of three circumstances: 1. The client's standard contract is reasonable. This is rare. 2. The client's standard contract is unreasonable, but they're willing to cross-out or rewrite the objectionable bits before signing. This is very common. 3. It's worth everybody's time and money to get our respective lawyers involved. Hint: This will cost at least $1000 for each side, assuming 3 hours of legal time at roughly $300/hour. This sort of email thread is one of several reasons I wouldn't touch a site like Gigster with a 10-foot pole. If I can't renegotiate an unreasonable contract, I'm not a respected consultant, I'm probably an interchangeable body.[1] If you can't afford three hours of your lawyer's time, you can't afford me. The other reason why I wouldn't touch a site like Gigster is that those sites almost always turn into a race to the bottom for low-value jobs for the most difficult clients. It's OK to do a couple of those jobs when you're starting out—but once you've done real projects, your time is better spent networking to find new contacts. [1] I might make exceptions for very large and established organizations, for the right project and budget.

danielweber 10y ago
In my experience, it's very unusual for a company to simply state that it won't talk about it at all. I get one of these two patterns: 1. "Oh, okay, we see your point. We'll cross out clauses X and Y." 2. "Oh, thank you, we'll take this very seriously. Now we will have people talk at you for hours about why you can trust us and everyone else here was dumb enough to sign up."
- dboreham 10y ago
  In my career I only had one case of #2. The person called me and said something like "if a partner isn't willing to sign agreement X, then we shouldn't be doing business with them". I said "ok" and hung up. An hour later that guy's bosses boss called me to apologize..
  - danielweber 10y ago

jheriko 10y ago

probably someone paid a lawyer to draw up, or copy-pasted that contract and then people who don't really care about their job to a serious level, or maybe just don't think very much, are saying it can't be changed - probably without even asking anyone who has authority to make that kind of decision. if you can get in touch with a director about this, and they are smart, they will probably want to fix this for everyone after about a moment's consideration.

donmatito 10y ago

"We never had a problem with this clause before, why would you want to change it?" Oh do I hate this line. But it's a two-way street. I'm very fortunate that for one of my first freelance gigs, I read the contract and specifically pointed out that I would be using personal/open sourced code snippets, and that I might want to reuse/open source some of the code I produced for them (only snippets with general interest). They agreed without a flinch, and thanks to that experience, I'm going to hold every other employer to the same standard "I never had a problem with this request with any other employer, why would you want to refuse?"

danjoc 10y ago
>I'm going to hold every other employer to the same standard "I never had a problem with this request with any other employer, why would you want to refuse?" I love that! I'm totally going with that next time :D Also, I'll probably throw in something like, "I'm surprised you say nobody else has mentioned it. This problem applies to anyone using open source code, which is basically everyone. Do you really want to hire developers who pay so little attention to details?"

ffef 10y ago

Another UpWork in the making...

dbg31415 10y ago

Legal Shit 101... if someone asks you to sign a contract, right away assume it's weighted in their favor. You have to read the contract before you sign it. Take your time, feel free to ask for a take-home copy and ask your lawyer to review it. Having asked a lot of people to sign contracts over the years... I'd say 90-95% don't read it and just sign where they are told to. Expedient... The contract template was written by the company's legal team to protect the company, it may have some terms in it that seem like they are an "agreement" (like how you'll get paid)... but really the goal is to keep the company safe. And, to be fair, I'd fire any lawyer who didn't give me a contract like that... so it's not the lawyer's fault. But if you sign it... you're agreeing to it. Easy solution: don't sign it. (But of course you presumably want the job.) Middle-ground solution: Read the contract, red-line / annotate things you have concerns / questions about, and ask if you can speak with legal. If it's a small business... they will probably weigh you comments against their lawyer's hourly cost... and more often than not just agree to let you cut things out of the contract. If it's a larger company... you're probably locked in if you want to work there -- that's just the reality of it. If you talk with legal, do your best to understand what their motivations are and make sure the contract is explicit. You can also ask for exceptions for side projects by simply declaring, "Any work done for side projects X, Y, Z shall not fall under the scope of this contract." Anyway look, it's a negotiation. You can test the limits, nothing is set in stone. You're the only one who is on your side. Everyone else is out to fuck you. Safe assumption.

ransom1538 10y ago

I get the whole 'this isn't fair argument.' But these contracts impact peoples livelihood so I will attempt to help. First, don't respond to HR with a complex set of legal questions. They wont know the answer and will push back -- corporate attorneys will charge astronomical amounts and these questions could even get the board involved -- which the CEO usually doesn't want to do. My suggestions: 1) The strike: Print the document, strike out what you don't want. Scan it, return it to the HR dept. with, "Hey cool signed!". Only do this if you are pretty senior. 2) The re-write: Take the document rewrite it, with the statements you don't like removed, then return it to HR with, "Hey cool signed!" 3) The 'it is coming!' (for junior guys): Take the email and delete it. Say you never got it. They will resend it, take it and place it into your spam folder, two weeks later say you never got it. Then reply back with your w9 two weeks later. Then if they complain reply with a w9 3 weeks later. Continue until you have clout then do 1 or 2.

logfromblammo 10y ago
Note that you can't do #2 if an officer of the company signs it first. But in my experience, documents like these don't even have a signature line for anyone other than you. So long as you are just unilaterally agreeing with yourself, you can agree to anything you like. You can write in that you're going to treat yourself to ice cream on the first Friday of every month! I wonder why companies even delude themselves into thinking such things are enforceable without a real, negotiated, two-party contract, with valuable consideration given by both sides. It's essentially just signing the document that says, "I have read the corporate handbook, including the company policy on X." If you violate the policy on X, their remedy is to dock your pay or fire you from the company. They can't lawfully enforce anything in court. (Which isn't to say that they won't ever win. The courts tend to favor those willing to pay the most to win.)
- ransom1538 10y ago
  "Note that you can't do #2 if an officer of the company signs it first." NEVER EVER seen this. Hell. I have never seen two signatures on anything in 12 years. AND I always add "you're going to treat yourself to ice cream on the first Friday of every month!" -- obviously. The point is no one checks - HR just wants to thumbs up.

ryanmarsh 10y ago

I would like to see similar threads published for the contracts used by other work sites and even clients using standard Legal Zoom contracts. This stuff is important. I always say: If you haven't been fucked you haven't been in business very long.

soyiuz 10y ago

Have a contract that you draft that they counter sign. Set your own terms there. Any potential conflict would have to go through court in any case. Obviously not legal advice.

matthewcford 10y ago

> "does not contain any third-party software, including without limitation, “open source,” “copy left,” “public” or other similar code or anything derived from or based on any of the foregoing" This contract has probably been written by a lawyer who doesn't understands software development. I run digital agency and we've lost projects in the past that couldn't get past legal departments because they did not want us to use any open source software (or transfer the copyright to open source work)

ChuckMcM 10y ago

This is a great example of something people should always look for. Contracts can be very uneven with regard to the rights of the parties. And if you ask to balance one out and the other party refuses, walk away. They will screw you.

ben1040 10y ago

> does not contain any third-party software, including without limitation, “open source,” “copy left,” “public” or other similar code or anything derived from or based on any of the foregoing (unless approved by Gigster in writing) So is a Gigster developer contractually obligated to build everything from zero and take advantage of no OSS whatsoever? This seems like asking to handcuff your developers into writing terrible software by reinventing the wheel. Or do they have some additional "in-writing" approval document that specifies acceptable OSS licenses? Several companies I've worked for had lists of OSS licenses that were reviewed and approved by general counsel as acceptable (pretty much the list boiled down to BSD, MIT, Apache). Then again it seems like if that were the case, the sensible approach would be to write the contract such that using open source software is acceptable, so long as it is offered under a license that appears on an approved list and does not obligate the release of the entire project's source code.

danielweber 10y ago
As bad as I think Gigster's agreement is, this clause is a good place to start from. It means that they don't have someone shoving GPL code into a project that must remain closed source.

wyc 10y ago

Another touchy issue is non-competes after employment, meaning that "you can't work for anyone else or hire our employees." States such as CA are very much against anything that restricts someone's ability to engage in free trade, especially when the restrictions apply post-employment. Imagine how ridiculous it would be to ask this of independent contractors, whose roles are defined by that they engage with multiple clients at once and have looser associations--that is, they are independent. Yet I see a lot of CA contracts for independents hold this clause, and even argue for its fairness. From the BAR[1]: Not only are non-compete covenants void in California, but an employer may be liable in tort for wrongful termination if it fires an employee who refuses to sign an employment agreement that contains an unenforceable covenant not to compete. D’Sa v. Playhut, Inc., 85 Cal. App. 4th 927 (Cal. Ct. App. 2000). This rule holds even if the agreement contains a choiceof-law or severability provision. Id. at 934. The concern is that the presence of an unenforceable non-compete covenant in an employment agreement may have an undesirable deterrent effect on employees who do not know their rights under California law. “[I]t is not likely that [the defendant’s] employees are sufficiently versed in California’s law of contracts such that they would know (1) that the covenant not to compete is invalid and therefore not enforceable by [the defendant] and (2) that they could sign the agreement without fear they would be bound by the covenant not to compete.” Id Read your contracts. Get attorney review and specifically ask about the parts that make you uncomfortable. If you're planning to make $XX,000 or more from this engagement, isn't it worth the $100-$300 for the guarantee? [1] https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/events/labor_law/2013/03/employment_rightsresponsibilitiescommitteemidwintermeeting/4_orrick.authcheckdam.pdf https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/events/labor_law...

ascendantlogic 10y ago

The contracts I have when working with clients specifically mention type A and type B deliverables. One being "secret sauce" IP that the company owns and the other being general development tools and practices that I own and grant a perpetual license to the company to use.

sixtypoundhound 10y ago

Ahh.... sounds like the script for a future Hollywood movie: "How to Lose a Talented Developer in 10 Seconds"

gargarplex 10y ago

Hi. If any developers want a rundown on legal ideas (good explanations of "indemnification", "representations and warranties", etc.), we offer that in our book, Code For Cash. (https://www.breakingintoconsulting.com https://www.breakingintoconsulting.com) Peter Krumins said, "The legal stuff is excellent. I was always afraid of that and spent many thousands of dollars on various lawyers to make a good agreement, and there were no good guides about what the terms such as 'indemnification' mean. That is really well explained." That's because the Legal Ideas chapter was written by a business attorney from Silicon Valley who has worked on both sides of the table. If you sign up for our mailing list, you get the entire Legal Ideas chapter for free during day 2 or day 3 of the autoresponder campaign. You may also purchase the entire book for a severe discount by using the HN-only link in my profile.

jlgaddis 10y ago
unsubscribe
- gargarplex 10y ago
  Thanks. You have been successfully removed from our mailing list.

sidchilling 10y ago

This is not just for contracts. Gigster does that even when recruiting. After three rounds of interview, I got a canned response that they are unable to take my application forward. I asked them for feedback and got the same reply that they can't provide any feedback (even after 3 rounds of interviews). I reached out to the developer who interviewed me and after a couple of days, he replied back saying that Gigster doesn't allow him to provide any feedback! Avoid interviewing with them, in my opinion.

Clanan 10y ago
This is true of practically every company. It's a liability issue - companies are afraid that feedback will be used in a lawsuit, so their favored course of action is to say nothing.

pbnjay 10y ago

I did a pre-screening with toptal and literally had these same questions... And they basically had the same responses. No thanks! I understand especially with the race to the bottom they'll always have someone new enough to sign these types of agreements, but everyone I know with experience or seniority avoids the platforms because of how ludicrous these restrictions are.

levlandau 10y ago

Cofounder here. Really appreciate the discussion and all of the feedback. The spirit of the contract's never been intended to be unreasonably restrictive -- though I totally understand the concern. We wanted to include certain terms since as part of our model, we do own the code written specifically for Gigster projects. We certainly don't want to own code folks write outside of Gigster projects. We've received very similar feedback recently and were going to do a review of the contract with our lawyers highlighting this specific issue. We'll also consider adding an FAQ around any contract nuances. We care about doing what is fair and while a lot of terms here are standard we'll try to review terms to make our position much clearer. Will share important updates. Thanks

adekok 10y ago
> we do own the code written specifically for Gigster projects. That's good. > We certainly don't want to own code folks write outside of Gigster projects. That's good. But the contract apparently says something else. This reminds me of a contract gig I had a while ago. I asked them similar questions about their contract, and they said "that's not what we intend to do". OK... so could they update the contract to state their real intentions? A: No. OK. I don't need the work that badly. If the contract starts with bad terms and them lying to me, there isn't much reason to move forward.
- BinaryIdiot 10y ago
  I mean, what would you like them to do? They're aware of it (and this thread obviously shined a brighter light on it) and are going to go over it with their lawyers. Isn't that reasonable? Contract changes don't exactly come quickly especially with expensive lawyers involved. I'm just not sure what you would like them to do about it right now.
  - adekok 10y ago
    > I'm just not sure what you would like them to do about it right now. The point is that when the contractor asked for changes, he got told to go stuff himself. It's only when there's larger publicity that they suggested the contract can change. And, TBH, it's ridiculous to construe my argument as they have to change right now. They were asked to change, and they refused. That's a problem. What part of that do you not understand?

logicallee 10y ago

Hey, I thought their answer was absolutely great!!! My thinking, reading ONLY the dev's original email, was the same as what they wrote: then I read their reply and found their phrasing MUCH better. Here's all you would have gotten from me: ------------------------------------ answer email I would have written ------------------------------ >Some questions I have about with this contract: (allowed for by section 11.5): >>"including source code developed by Contractor ... generally applicable to other Customer projects" We do not claim the source code for work you do that is unrelated to and not used by your work for us. If you develop some tooling that is general but used in the project, you have to assign rights. If you can't assign rights (for example it's open-source) don't use it. Use only new code that you develop and assign over to us fully. >"Contractor agrees to indemnify Gigster from any and all claims, damages, liability, settlement, attorneys’ fees and expenses, as incurred, on account of the foregoing or any breach of this agreement" Your reading is correct and we have absolutely no desire to appear in court for any reason. You waive all your rights to sue us. If you do want to sue someone, you will have to go work for a big company and go sue them, they will be happy to appear any number of times to dispute anything you want. We are not going to change that language. That said we haven't had disagreements and don't intend to have any - we rely on you, after all. Put another way, we pay you more instead of taking that money and paying some lawyers to go argue with you. (This clause specifically prevents frivolous lawsuits - I want to reiterate that we don't have disputes with our developers. You can go talk to them and see how they are treated.) >>"does not contain any third-party software, including without limitation, “open source,” “copy left,” “public” or other similar code or anything derived from or based on any of the foregoing" >So I can't derive code from examples from django or flask documentation, cited stack overflow snippets, etc. etc. in my work? I'm not sure that would be a very effective way to operate. There is nothing stopping Django from suing anyone using any of the source code they have included in their documentation. Copyleft is even stronger and our clients would be bound to freely make available the complete source code used by anything. My suggestion is to learn to program, by reading documentation, and then simply code your own solutions. Likewise you can certainly peruse Stack Overflow for inspiration. I will add that as a general rule we are not concerned about software patents, so that you do not have to be concerned about your "inspiration" leading you to use a technique whose implementation is generally protected (no matter what specific source code implements it). However, as legal advice, please don't actively seek out patent status (willful infringement is a multiplier on damages) and if you do learn of a software patent affecting an algorithm you wish to use, seek an alternative. We've literally never had an issue with licensing. So to summarize: by all means, read other people's code to learn a language. Read other people's responses on stack overflow and in documentation to learn specific approaches. By all means learn to program, from any source you want. Write your own code and assign it to your clients. I hope this helps answer your questions as well as tell you some of our thinking. Our developers are treated very well. Let me know if there's anything else I can tell you or if you have any other questions! " ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ that's literally what I would have said. There's nothing that needs clarification or change and the language the original dev quoted is incredibly clear and perfectly fair. But, man, their response is even better. It says the same thing - but so much better. (Actually I lied - I wouldn't have thought of saying they treat developers really well -- so I included that part in my statement of what I would have written, even though I wouldn't have written it.) In all this is awesome work by them : ) I don't have any disclaimer to make - no relation to the dev or Gigster. -- EDIT: I got downvoted but their response is still absolutely fine.

ABCLAW 10y ago

There is a lot of legal misinformation in this thread, as is common on HN, both on the substance and practice-in-fact. For readers in a similar contractual pickle, take things read here with a grain of salt. Most assume very specific things about your information and bargaining position which may not apply. In general, the applicability and effect of broad catch-all employment agreement's clauses will vary between jurisdictions - This is part of why they're drafted in a hyper-defensive manner. No small business is going to shell out for legal to obtain 300+ jurisdiction specific form agreements. There may be very clear bright-line rules dealing with your issues as raised which put you in the clear, but you won't know unless you consult an expert. Because of the nature of the employment bar, you can get straightforward accurate advice for very little investment - if you approach obtaining advice properly. Take the time to draft an email to local employment counsel setting out your concerns, attaching the proposed agreement and setting out the scope of review you would like him to perform. Ask for a quote. Repeat until you find a good fit.

goldfishcaura 10y ago

So I hate to disappoint everyone. Such contract really cannot be viewed the way this was summarized through an email. One paragraph has to be interpreted in the context of everything else. Moreover, everyone uses this language. It is funny, but I suspect that most of Silicon Valley just recycles the same 3-4 contracts, that individual lawyers just modify slightly. I have now worked with 60+ tech companies (Looker, Gigster, Strava, etc) - with 15 of them I had to look over the verbiage on my own. With a first couple, I was just as suspicious. But after discussing with lawyers, I learned that there are two major issues: 1) not everything put in the contract is enforceable. In fact, just because all lawyers recycle the same contract, does not make it more enforceable. It is a simple leverage in bullying that lawyers depend on, should something occur 2) individual paragraphs have to be interpreted in the context of the entire engagement. In other words, did you have have access to Client's data on other projects. Yes, then you bet, your IP rights should be waived as they pertain to those projects. Bottom line, relax and focus on good faith.

ghurtado 10y ago
> Bottom line, relax and focus on good faith. That is quite possibly the WORST legal advice that I've ever heard with regards to contract law (and you're in very tough competition here)
cuspycode 10y ago
Anything not enforceable shouldn't be in the contract in the first place. The only purpose of contracts is to enforce earlier promises when people don't agree anymore.

scottbcovert 10y ago

I joined Gigster mid-November 2016 and had similar concerns as the OP regarding specific clauses of the contract. This is definitely a tough situation for a developer going through onboarding-personally I wanted the first impression I left to be that I'm a "team player," as opposed to starting a legal battle on day one. Unfortunately, these interactions always seem to favor companies over individuals. People in general don't enjoy bickering over legalese so individuals don't want to ruffle feathers by pushing back, while company employees are able to take cover under the umbrella that they're just following policy. Truthfully though, it is most often companies-not prospective employees-that initiate legal discussions by presenting contracts and individuals should feel justified in verbalizing any concerns they have. I think this is possible while still remaining professional and courteous. The first thing I did was look to Google to see if any other developers in the past had similar concerns as me, which brought me to this Quora post - https://www.quora.com/Is-the-contract-for-Gigster-reasonable-for-the-developer https://www.quora.com/Is-the-contract-for-Gigster-reasonable... Richard's response was helpful and thorough (if you're reading this, thank you!) and although he had additional issues with the contract, my main concern was with sections 2.1 and 2.2 (assignment of IP to Gigster for work not specific to the customer and the exemption of pre-existing IP from being assigned to Gigster including only that which is explicitly outlined, respectively). I actually discussed the contract language with my family and got some good advice from both my father and brother. They agreed I was within my right to voice my concerns so long as I did it in a productive way. For example, instead of presenting problems by just stating language I didn't like they told me it would be better to provide solutions in my response by offering amendments that I would feel comfortable with. To this point I had interacted with three individuals: 1. The person who had reached out to me about joining Gigster 2. The individual that emailed me the DocuSign link containing the contract and 3. The individual that sent me a (possibly automated) response after my application was submitted to their website. Let's call these individuals Peter, Paul, & Mary. I emailed my concerns to Paul and Mary, not knowing which would be better to handle this sort of thing. I received word back from Mary saying that Paul was more familiar with the contract so she'd let him handle it. After two days I received an email from Peter asking for an update on my onboarding process. I explained that I had emailed Paul about the contract and hadn't received word back but that I'd ping him again. Peter told me he would also follow up through other channels. I never did get a response from Paul personally, but after another two days I received word from Peter that he had spoken with Paul and the Gigster legal team and was wondering if I could hop on the phone. Peter was very open to my concerns and explained the reasoning behind the contract language. I said that I understood, but that admittedly I still took issue with it. Peter seemed to understand and honestly that was pretty much that. He offered to share a Google Doc with me so I could highlight/tweak language I was uncomfortable with and afterwards the contract was promptly signed by both parties. I also reached out internally to Peter, Paul, and Mary over slack before making this post so they could have a heads up. Paul explained to me that he was not really involved with the Gigster contract or its hiring policies, just that his role involved setting up the onboarding tools and this automatically attached his email to a lot of the communications; which would explain the lack of responses I saw. Paul told me he was “neither encouraging nor discouraging [me] from posting,” but Peter and Mary responded in support of me posting my experience to HN, which I thought was pretty cool. For future reference here is a portion of my email to Gigster containing the changes I requested, which were accommodated: I am a little uncomfortable with some of the language in sections 2.1 & 2.2 and was hoping we could revise: a. Section 2.1 assigns ownership to Gigster not only of all Deliverables, which makes total sense, but also of all source code "including but not limited to source code developed or created by Contractor that is not specific to Customer and is generally applicable to other Customer projects and deliverables ("Community Code")." This language seems quite broad and what constitutes "Community Code" seems a bit difficult to define; I'd prefer to remove the last part of this sentence so the section instead reads "...or any Confidential Information (as defined below) (collectively, “Inventions”). Contractor hereby makes all.." b. Section 2.2 exempts any of my pre-existing IP from being assigned ownership to Gigster, but then seems to require all such pre-existing IP be disclosed in writing. This seems difficult and probably unnecessary so I'd like to remove "in each case ((a) and (b)) that are expressly set forth in writing to Gigster prior to delivery of the Deliverables to Gigster." and just end the sentence after "any intellectual property rights therein."

RainManDetroit 10y ago

Reminds me of when I was outright sued over a YouTube video on my channel - twice. It doesn't matter how many "thousands of successful milestones and payments without issues with the terms," there is a vital flaw (in their favor) with said contract. Contracts are easily done on a case-by-case basis, and dubious clauses are routinely renegotiated. All of this is irrelevant however when even the lawyers won't answer a simple contract law question. I won both of the suits mentioned above by proving their position to be indefensible. Which I believe you have done. Keep your integrity, your current and future clients will recognize it.

RainManDetroit 10y ago

P.S. It would be interesting what stance they would take to you being named as co-owners of any IP developed, and royalties paid for any further use beyond current project. My brother is a mechanical engineer and original designs in his lab always have him as a registered patent holder.

20years 10y ago

"We have yet to have a disagreement (much less a legal battle) over the terms here. We have completed thousands of successful milestones and payments without issues with the terms and we unfortunately cannot adjust them on a case by case basis." Note to self: Don't hire Gigster developers. If a dev does not pay attention to this kind of stuff or thinks it's okay, I don't feel all that comfortable having them work on my projects.

jtchang 10y ago

Good to know Gigster really doesn't care about the developer. Will let my friends know not use it.

apercu 10y ago

If you can clearly demonstrate that you are not competing with your employer, using their IP, working on their time, using their equipment then these types of non-competes should be null and void. And yes, I quit a job over that kind of contract. If I invent something on my time it's mine.

rajacombinator 10y ago

Yikes. Just applied to gigster the other day. This thread has definitely made me reconsider.

baseh 10y ago

From their website (homepage): > Gigster is a smart software development service, combining top developers and designers with artificial intelligence. Am I the only one who does not understand what that even means? Do they bring together matching developers and designers using their artificial intelligent algorithms or the developers and designers they hire have artificial intelligence?

xiaoma 10y ago

After seeing this, I have zero respect for gigster or anyone who empowers this behavior. They're asking for unilateral power to end the software career of any of their contractors, even decades into the future. Worse still, the demand their contractors to sign away any legal right to recourse... And in exchange they offer mediocre contracting work. Screw those guys.

chrisbennet 10y ago

A contract needs a couple of things in order to be valid: 1. A meeting of minds i.e. both parties agree on something. 2. Consideration; usually money. (This is why you sometimes see donated things sold for a dollar.) When faced with signing a new contract that asks for more of something, I'd recommend asking for consideration of some sort. (1) "Oh, new contract? Let's talk about my new salary." (1) At least if you're an in-demand software developer.

danielweber 10y ago
Continued employment counts as consideration in many states.
- chrisbennet 10y ago
  The old "I won't beat you up if you stop seeing my sister." "consideration". But you make a good point that I wasn't aware of. That's why it only works if you're in a field like software development where you have some leverage.