some thoughts...
- you might suggest that the work is not patentable, as the methods are common to similar systems. Likewise, asserting a copyright when the methods have so much in common with standard professional approaches will not be productive. He's benefitting from the experience you bring from prior work and your subsequent clients will benefit from experience you will gain in this project. You're going to be using methods and classes you've developed before or obtained from colleagues and you could well whip up some here that you'll use later on. If he wants a 100% unique work product, then it will have to be much more expensive, and maybe not as good.
- you might also suggest that if his real intention is that other clients of yours not benefit from his investment, that he might pay for that right
- if he's concerned about being able to maintain the code after you're gone, you can give him the unlocked tafs, and have him sign that he won't resell to others.
- if you haven't come to an agreement yet, he can simply specify in your contract that this is 'work for hire', which gives him ownership and copyright to your work (bad for you). Never ever sign anything with 'work for hire' in it. That gives you the same rights to your own work as an employee has.
On Jul 5, 2004, at 9:01 AM, Dan Stein wrote:
I have a potential client that is real confused about copywrite vs. ownership of code.
He want to know that the look and feel of his site is copywrited. I can understand that.
But he also wants in an agreement that the he would own the code used to
develop the site.
Since it is basically a course registration system I am not willing to give
him an agreement saying I would not use the same code to develop a course
registration system on another area other than his market.
I can see a non-compete agreement but that would still only cover his market.
Any thoughts on how to best handle this with him?
Any sample agreements someone could share that might cover this?
This is the 1st time I have run into this request.
-- Dan Stein
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