Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#111

Post by pabs3 » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 10:50 AM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #12

mcv wrote: post #6

Whether or not your employer can claim ownership in court depends entirely on your contract. But no matter what's in your contact, that route is probably not your best option. From what I understand, you created, in your own time, a project that is valuable to your employer, and that they want to use and develop. You're the expert on this project. Not just that, you designed every aspect of it, popularised it, and yo…

> Whether or not your employer can claim ownership in court depends entirely on your contract. Entirely this. I got burned by this years ago, developing side project that was completely unrelated to the sort of work my employer did, and was not developed using any company resources. But my employment contract specified that my employer had first rights to anything I developed at all during the term of my employment.…

I went further and negotiated copyright ownership of all open source code I produce for my employer:

https://lists.sfconservancy.org/pipermail/contractpatch/2018...

Software Freedom Conservancy reminded me that everything is negotiable:

https://sfconservancy.org/contractpatch/

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#112

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 10:51 AM UTC

yolo42 wrote: post #49

relaunched wrote: post #23

Find a lawyer, ASAP, that specializes in employment and / or IP. This is a legal issue and you need to solve it with people that know the law. Talking, signing, admitting things, etc, only hurt you. Depending on your country and state, as well as your employment agreement, there are a lot of impactful variables. Intuition and personal relationships are not going to help you solve this issue, especially, absent knowin…

Thank you for the comment! I totally get what you and other threads are trying to say and I don't disagree with what you are saying. I probably should have cleared this out in my original post (my bad) that I do not wish to pursue the legal route. I personally feel that in my case, it will just drain everyone's energy for not much gain at the end. Also, personal relationships matter to me as well. I'm trying to find…

You still need legal advice, even if you do not wish to pursue the legal route because your position and its strength need to be established.

If you don't want to do even that then my advice to you would be to hand over the code, fork it, leave this employer and call it a day.

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#113

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 10:54 AM UTC

rkagerer wrote: post #87

yolo42 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the comment! I totally get what you and other threads are trying to say and I don't disagree with what you are saying. I probably should have cleared this out in my original post (my bad) that I do not wish to pursue the legal route. I personally feel that in my case, it will just drain everyone's energy for not much gain at the end. Also, personal relationships matter to me as well. I'm trying to find…

You really should consult with an IP lawyer, for all the reasons mentioned here. You may have to reset your expectations about walking away with both compensation AND control.

You will have to reset all of your expectations, regardless of their combinations. OP has made some strategical errors already and it now depends on the exact writing of his employment contract and the jurisdiction they are in what options are still on the table.

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#114

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 10:55 AM UTC

runninganyways wrote: post #57

bdowling wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If he had that kind of money he'd be talking to a lawyer not us. He, and you, may not know that you do not always need money up front to engage the services of a lawyer. Many lawyers extend credit to their clients or allow clients to condition their fee on a successful outcome (a contingent fee). Depending on the desired outcome in this case, such an arrangement may be easy. For example, if OP wants to arrange a sa…

My point is you don't need to say obvious things. It's a waste of everyone's time.

Given the amount of pushback on that in this thread from you and plenty of others it does not seem that it is all that obvious.

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#115

Post by ownagefool » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 10:58 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #109

thayne wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find kneejerk advice to consult lawyers for anything that concerns the law frustrating for two reasons: 1. It never seems to be accompanied with advice on how to find the appropriate kind of lawyer. 2. It almost always seems to ignore the fact that lawyers are expensive. Sure, there are times when that cost is warranted, but I don't think it is right to ignore it. For example, in this case, it is probably only wort…

If you have a medical problem, you go to a doctor. If you have a legal problem, you go to a lawyer. If you can't afford a lawyer you might as well roll over right now because that will be the end game. The idea that some advice given in an online forum would reduce the need for finding a lawyer is akin to taking medical advice from a forum. You have no idea what the qualifications/experience/jurisdictions are of the…

In the US maybe.

In the UK, most of my lawyer friends would tell you that lawyering up is the last course of action you want to take, as it tends to make issues more complicated, expensive and combative, though you might want to be careful what you admit / agree to.

My wifes a solicitor. :)

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#116

Post by Rainymood » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 11:11 AM UTC

Step 1. Realize that advice on HN is often wrong and very one-sided (i.e. they were dead wrong about Dropbox)

Step 2. Figure out what you want, and why, and get it in writing. Figure out what your company wants, and why, and get it in writing. Then open a dialogue and its time to start talking and negotiating!

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#117

Post by otabdeveloper4 » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 11:11 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #109

thayne wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find kneejerk advice to consult lawyers for anything that concerns the law frustrating for two reasons: 1. It never seems to be accompanied with advice on how to find the appropriate kind of lawyer. 2. It almost always seems to ignore the fact that lawyers are expensive. Sure, there are times when that cost is warranted, but I don't think it is right to ignore it. For example, in this case, it is probably only wort…

If you have a medical problem, you go to a doctor. If you have a legal problem, you go to a lawyer. If you can't afford a lawyer you might as well roll over right now because that will be the end game. The idea that some advice given in an online forum would reduce the need for finding a lawyer is akin to taking medical advice from a forum. You have no idea what the qualifications/experience/jurisdictions are of the…

> ...is akin to taking medical advice from a forum.

Listening to doctors instead of carefully reading forums would have probably left me seriously crippled. Doctors hold no real liability, nor do they have any real expertise outside their (very narrow) problem domain.

There is no substitute for doing your own research if you want something done right.

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#118

Post by ThePhysicist » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 11:12 AM UTC

It’s not really possible to give specific advice without knowing which jurisdiction you’re in. In most European countries there are laws that govern employee inventions and grant a share of the profits of an invention to the employee (in Germany e.g. the Mitarbeitererfindungsgesetz). Besides advising you to talk to a lawyer - which people already did here - there’s really little to say without knowing more details. If you can provide at least the country your employer is based in it might allow people to give more specific advice.

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#119

Post by reynard_le_faux » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 11:22 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #109

thayne wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find kneejerk advice to consult lawyers for anything that concerns the law frustrating for two reasons: 1. It never seems to be accompanied with advice on how to find the appropriate kind of lawyer. 2. It almost always seems to ignore the fact that lawyers are expensive. Sure, there are times when that cost is warranted, but I don't think it is right to ignore it. For example, in this case, it is probably only wort…

If you have a medical problem, you go to a doctor. If you have a legal problem, you go to a lawyer. If you can't afford a lawyer you might as well roll over right now because that will be the end game. The idea that some advice given in an online forum would reduce the need for finding a lawyer is akin to taking medical advice from a forum. You have no idea what the qualifications/experience/jurisdictions are of the…

So we should take advice to get a lawyer from a forum, but not take advice not to get a lawyer from a forum?

Re: Ask HN: My company wants my side project. What can I do?

#120

Post by ianai » Sat, Dec 14, 2019, 11:25 AM UTC

prox wrote: post #103

fsloth wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't go to the lawyer to sue your employer. You go there to understand your legal position. This gives you leverage in negotiations. The way you use that leverage is then explain why you feel something is not fair. In a professional context, you can explain your position in legal terms when you take a compassionate, kind stance, smile and analytically explain the situation from both sides. It's no more different…

I wholeheartedly agree with your comment. The core is that OP created something of value, in his own time. So there should be a value exchange of some sort.

Unless he’s a salary employee. In that case, he’s technically always on the clock or could be argued to be so. If you want your time to yourself then stay an hourly employee.