Chad Leigh -- Shire.Net LLC writes: > Their employers are paying them TO WORK on FreeBSD. They are not taking > their code that they write for their employers and also sticking it in > FreeBSD. Big difference.
Not if their work consists of writing code. In that case, the copyright in the code belongs to their employer (in the U.S., and in a number of other countries with similar provisions). Under 17 USC 101: "A 'work made for hire' is— (1) a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment; or (2) a work specially ordered or commissioned for use as a contribution to a collective work, as a part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, as a translation, as a supplementary work, as a compilation, as an instructional text, as a test, as answer material for a test, or as an atlas, if the parties expressly agree in a written instrument signed by them that the work shall be considered a work made for hire. [...]" Note that a "collective work" is generally a book or a movie, not a computer operating system: "A 'collective work' is a work, such as a periodical issue, anthology, or encyclopedia, in which a number of contributions, constituting separate and independent works in themselves, are assembled into a collective whole." "Computer program" is separately defined, which means that it is not a collective work. > In the first case, they are allowing it to happen and assign > the copyrights as necessary. Do they do this in writing before the code becomes a part of the project? Do they have a written agreement with their employees that explicitly waives their work-for-hire interest in the copyright? -- Anthony _______________________________________________ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to "[EMAIL PROTECTED]"