Thanks for the detailed reply. I found a post from 2002 with a similar citation regarding NY's classes of employees: http://www.perlmonks.org/?displaytype=print

Thanks for the detailed reply. I found a post from 2002 with a similar citation regarding NY's classes of employees: http://www.perlmonks.org/?displaytype=print;node_id=153046 http://www.perlmonks.org/?displaytype=print;node_id=153046 He doesn't explicitly state if his open source work was entirely done on his own time and equipment or done during down time at work or such, but it might be the case in his post there. It's strange. As you probably know, the work for hire exception to copyright comes from the 1976 Federal Copyright Act. It doesn't extend to times when you are not at work, or have a 24/7 idea for professionals. It's also the case that nearly every state has hourly, contract and salary/overtime exempt employment categories, yet no other states I know of extend work for hire to off hours in the absence of a contract. If this doctrine can indeed be found in NY State Law, it would seem to be a state regulating something that only Congress has a right to regulate, which is copyright law (Article I, Section 8, Clause 8). It would be really interesting to see the text of the NY state law on this, maybe I'll be able to find it some time.