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I think it's more that Zenimax thinks it owns the unique ideas that Carmack, a top talent in his field, created while he was working there. They're not angry th

I think it's more that Zenimax thinks it owns the unique ideas that Carmack, a top talent in his field, created while he was working there. They're not angry that he wrote the same 4x4 matrix inverse function for both them and Oculus. Or more specifically, if Zenimax's claims are correct, while he was working on company time and equipment.

jandrese 10y ago
What is the alternative? Do we force everybody to undergo mind wipes whenever they leave the company so they don't take any skills they picked up on the job with them? How many people can forget everything they know every time they get a new job?
- wmf 10y ago
  The alternative is probably non-compete contracts (which are enforceable if paid) so that people don't immediately go from one company to its direct competitor.
- leggomylibro 10y ago
  I think it's a balancing act with plenty of gray area. Personally, I almost always side with employees in cases like this, because it's ridiculous to me that a company could claim ownership of things that its employees create which are unrelated to their jobs, or which they produced with their own time and resources. But I also think that there are some people who are exceptional cases. The real high earners in a company, especially if they're technical staff, are probably real luminaries in their field, and the company is paying them a significant premium in both money and autonomy because they believe that such an employee will produce a lot of valuable new ideas for the company. So if your rock star programming wizard quits to start a new company, taking a project that they've been iterating on during work hours on their company computer for the past 6 months while they were drawing a paycheck...well, if you look at it from the company's point of view, you can understand why they would feel like they got robbed blind.
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jandrese 10y ago

What is the alternative? Do we force everybody to undergo mind wipes whenever they leave the company so they don't take any skills they picked up on the job with them? How many people can forget everything they know every time they get a new job?

wmf 10y ago
The alternative is probably non-compete contracts (which are enforceable if paid) so that people don't immediately go from one company to its direct competitor.
leggomylibro 10y ago
I think it's a balancing act with plenty of gray area. Personally, I almost always side with employees in cases like this, because it's ridiculous to me that a company could claim ownership of things that its employees create which are unrelated to their jobs, or which they produced with their own time and resources. But I also think that there are some people who are exceptional cases. The real high earners in a company, especially if they're technical staff, are probably real luminaries in their field, and the company is paying them a significant premium in both money and autonomy because they believe that such an employee will produce a lot of valuable new ideas for the company. So if your rock star programming wizard quits to start a new company, taking a project that they've been iterating on during work hours on their company computer for the past 6 months while they were drawing a paycheck...well, if you look at it from the company's point of view, you can understand why they would feel like they got robbed blind.

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