/tech/ - Technology

the question is how much "during your course of your employment" encompasses. Let's hope it means "during company hours", because then you can say that anything you thought of during work hours was actually conceived before that.

Is this your first job? This is literally every company's contract for anything IP related, nothing special.

>>547412

>Nothing special.

Well, it is standard, but it's not insignificant.

My dad used to rant about this one patent that his boss at IBM filed that was based solely on his work. It was a multi-million dollar patent that made IBM millions, but my dad never saw a penny of it. He had a high salary, but he IBM got the better end of the deal, that's for sure.

What do you mean how fucked are you? That's what a job is. You write code for someone else. They sell your code for massive profit and have full ownership. That's how it works unless you are working for yourself.

Everything you write will have their name on it, and you have no right to sell it, all profit goes to the owners, and most non-competition agreements have you agree that you won't do something similar for at least a year after you leave. Basically, don't come up with any big profitable ideas at work unless you want to get fucked out of most of the profit.

>>547419

Also, people in management at IBM used to own a lot of patents and would direct development into projects that would require their patents. Funny stuff.

>>547421

>That's how it works unless you are working for yourself.

Yup. That's why working for yourself or having ownership in the company is the ideal.

>>547425

Yeah, but that's a lot easier said than done, if it's your first programming gig you pretty much have to go the traditional route and just gain experience for a while. It sucks, but that's just how it is.

>>547348

Just fucking ask your manager.

>Hey, I sort of have a hobby running open source software projects and I just wanna know if I can keep the rights to something I come up with for fun outside of work hours.

He'll probably say

>Oh yeah, that's fine. If you're not doing it on our time you can keep it.

And even if it does work the way you're afraid it will, it's not like you're gonna get caught maintaining a little GPL'd project on gitgud using a fake name. Nobody's going to care or even know if you do. Just pop the question to soothe your fears.

Beautiful

https://sketchfab.com/models/0f498a484a6c4a7ca9e74a84d9a02171

>>547447

Why don't you just say you did on your own time?

Don't push to your git repo on work hours, and work on it on work hours. Who the fuck is gonna know?

>>547497

It's dependent on the terms of the contract. If the stuff I do on my free time belongs to me, then there's no issue. However, some companies try to claim projects that you do in your free time while you are their employee. In that case, a fake repo would be necessary to make it seem like someone else is running the project.

>>547348

This is just the company trying to cover their asses, I highly doubt any of it would hold up in court. Just don't use company resources to develop your own software or work on personal shit during your hours. Assume everything you do is recorded and documented so tread carefully.

I worked for a driveway sealing/lawncare company as a teen that made me sign a waver basically saying I will never and can never start my own business doing what they do. Too bad I still do it occasionally in my local area. What are they going to do? Sue me for cutting grass? Please, they just didn't want me going out and lying about how much work I did while pocketing cash, this seems like the same thing.

>>547348

I bypass this by developing things that would only serve to ruin my employer utterly. Yes. please test out what I made while connected to the company intranet.

It all depends on what relationship definition you fit. I assume, by the clause, that you are a professional employee instead of hourly or a contractor.

As a professional employee relationship there aren't set hours, or a set place, for your employment.

So basically, they fucking own everything you make.

Don't sign the contract as-is. Make changes to protect your afterhour work. Make sure to emphasize that you want some non-compete context for work done after hours and it should be okayed.

>>547715

Actually I'd forgotten that you'd already signed it. Well, just make sure any project you start or contribute to is a freetard project under a pseudonym, I guess, although realistically if you're not competing with the company or turn it into a thriving business idea they're not going to attempt to even give a shit.

>>547348

Your employer owns the work that they pay you to do for them. This is especially true when on the clock.

Anything you do outside work, not for your employer, is yours.

This is common business law which no employee contract can override.

OP here. I just heard back from HR. They clarified that as long as it's in my free time, does not use company resources, and does not relate to the company's work, I still own it.

>>547911

If you're serious about making a side project, I would get that in writing if it's not already stipulated in your contract.

>>547348

> Let's talk about IP rights

We might as well talk about unicorns.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.html