4 ms·

UK law is pretty clear: if you are a contractor then you own everything you create, but if you are a salaried employee (”work for hire”) then your employer owns

UK law is pretty clear: if you are a contractor then you own everything you create, but if you are a salaried employee (”work for hire”) then your employer owns everything you create that’s related to the business. If you write Perl for a bank they don’t own the songs you compose in the shower (they afe outside the ”scope of employment”.) They probably own your money manager side project though. “Probably” here means, as always, “has a good chance of winning at tribunal” rather than any defensible logical meaning.

Silhouette 5y ago
The default position might be something like that but anyone writing software professionally surely has explicit provisions in their employment contract that would take precedence (as long as they hold up to any legal challenge of course).
- ajb 5y ago
  Contacts don't override every law. Ever heard of inalienable rights? Those are ones that you can't contact away.
  - Silhouette 5y ago
    Which "inalienable right" applies here?
    - ajb 5y ago
      In fact in the UK I think you are right, my apologies. It's California where the Labour code protects inventions made in the employees own time: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=LAB&sectionNum=2870 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio....
- masklinn 5y ago
  > as long as they hold up to any legal challenge of course Which they don't because it makes no sense. Transpose to a car mechanic fixing up junkers in their spare time, does the fixed junker belong to the company? Of course not.
  - Xylakant 5y ago
    This is not a good analogy. A substantial chunk of the value of software is often the idea, not only the time worked on something. Ideas and inventions don’t happen on a schedule. Think of a chemist that is tasked with finding a way to synthesize a compound. He tries all day at work, and in the evening, on the couch, he’s struck by a bolt of enlightenment. Who does that idea belong to? German law would be pretty clear - to the company. And often, software is similar.
    - masklinn 5y ago
      > And often, software is similar. That only holds if the side-project is exactly what the company does, and even then it’s debatable: if a person is interested in problem X and has personal projects around X, and the company hires them because if that, do they really expect that person to stop being interested in X on a personal level?
      - Xylakant 5y ago
        It’s often sufficient if the general field of work matches, though to a varying degree. > if a person is interested in problem X and has personal projects around X, and the company hires them because if that, do they really expect that person to stop being interested in X on a personal level? This is exactly where you start entering a problematic grey area. The employer hired and pays the employee exactly to gain access and make use of that knowledge and interest and pays a wage exactly for that. And at the same time, the employee wants to continue working on their open source project, giving away exactly that knowledge for free, which potentially diminishes the value that the employer pays for. There’s a fundamental tension here which is difficult to resolve. Open communication helps, explicitly spelling out the boundaries as well. It’s impossible to tell from the tweet which side failed here to what degree, but getting a sign-off from management in edge cases is definitely a good idea.

Silhouette 5y ago

The default position might be something like that but anyone writing software professionally surely has explicit provisions in their employment contract that would take precedence (as long as they hold up to any legal challenge of course).

ajb 5y ago
Contacts don't override every law. Ever heard of inalienable rights? Those are ones that you can't contact away.
- Silhouette 5y ago
  Which "inalienable right" applies here?
  - ajb 5y ago
    In fact in the UK I think you are right, my apologies. It's California where the Labour code protects inventions made in the employees own time: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=LAB&sectionNum=2870 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio....
masklinn 5y ago
> as long as they hold up to any legal challenge of course Which they don't because it makes no sense. Transpose to a car mechanic fixing up junkers in their spare time, does the fixed junker belong to the company? Of course not.
- Xylakant 5y ago
  This is not a good analogy. A substantial chunk of the value of software is often the idea, not only the time worked on something. Ideas and inventions don’t happen on a schedule. Think of a chemist that is tasked with finding a way to synthesize a compound. He tries all day at work, and in the evening, on the couch, he’s struck by a bolt of enlightenment. Who does that idea belong to? German law would be pretty clear - to the company. And often, software is similar.
  - masklinn 5y ago
    > And often, software is similar. That only holds if the side-project is exactly what the company does, and even then it’s debatable: if a person is interested in problem X and has personal projects around X, and the company hires them because if that, do they really expect that person to stop being interested in X on a personal level?
    - Xylakant 5y ago
      It’s often sufficient if the general field of work matches, though to a varying degree. > if a person is interested in problem X and has personal projects around X, and the company hires them because if that, do they really expect that person to stop being interested in X on a personal level? This is exactly where you start entering a problematic grey area. The employer hired and pays the employee exactly to gain access and make use of that knowledge and interest and pays a wage exactly for that. And at the same time, the employee wants to continue working on their open source project, giving away exactly that knowledge for free, which potentially diminishes the value that the employer pays for. There’s a fundamental tension here which is difficult to resolve. Open communication helps, explicitly spelling out the boundaries as well. It’s impossible to tell from the tweet which side failed here to what degree, but getting a sign-off from management in edge cases is definitely a good idea.