FN-FORUM: Intellectual Property

date posted 1st August 2005 13:52

I was just reading through a forum im a regular at and one point has
been under a lot of discussion, intellectual property and the
protection of it. This is quite a common problem, but a less discussed
variation of it was in this forum post.

The poster was stating that he hired a programmer to make him a custom
script, no legally binding document was signed, we all know this was
his mistake and not what i mean to discuss. The programmer has started
to sell the clients work, undercutting the clients price and basically
ruining his business plan.

What i want to know is what are the rights of both parties? Having no
legal documention, i took an uneducated guess that theres not a lot
the client can do, the programmer has the right to profit from the
script as its his intellectual property, he coded it, even though it
was made to the clients exact specifications and had all the clients
ideas. Also the client could carry on and sell the script aswell, as
he also owns it.

I stated that i had no idea if this was the case or not and was very
much a guess yet i get my head bitten off by another forum member
stating that if i was correct and you goto a tailor with an idea for a
suit then get it made to your specifications then the tailor would
also own the suit and have the right to wear it. I replied saying that
obviously was not the case, however the tailor would have the right to
make an exact copy of the suit and sell it, providing there was no
legal document preventing him to do so.

So I open this point for discussion. I believe it'll be quite an active one=
.

Cheers,
Tam Denholm
www.dreadlabs.com