Re: Non contracted intelectual property.

Maybe you should also be asking
"Did you have any legal right to their software?" ;)

Friendly sarcasm aside, Copyright laws in the US address the circumstances of employees creating works for their employers under a doctrine called "works made for hire." This doctrine is partially codified by definition in Section 101 of Title 17. You can also read more in circular 9 from the copyright office - www.copyright.gov/circs/circ09.pdf

As you can see, this provision automatically places authorship of certain instances of employee-created works in the hands of the employer. Issues (like you raised) of works made outside the scope of an employee's responsibility, outside of employement hours, before beginning employment, etc. are hammered out in case law and are best resolved with the help of a lawyer familiar with your specific situation.

On 1/8/07, Brian Lucas <bcl1713[_at_]gmail.com> wrote:
> This is purely for my curiosity's sake as the situation has already been
> settled but I was curious if anyone could give me some information or
> maybe a case law or two to back me up. I was working for a restaurant
> in my area as their kitchen manager. They were completely lacking in
> any sort of inventory management when I started there. I decided on my
> own accord to write a little program in sql using Access (on my personal
> computer using my copy of access) in order to keep track of their
> inventory. I was never commissioned to write this program. I wrote a
> minimum of 75% of the program on my own time. A maximum of 25% however
> was completed on work time when I had some downtime and nothing else to
> do. When I quit my job, the owner and GM "claimed" they had talked to
> their lawyer and owned the rights to this program. I denied them and
> they "decided not to pursue it". Did they have any legal right to my
> software?
>
> Brian
Received on Wed Jan 10 2007 - 02:05:45 GMT