Typically in legal circles ownership is given to the creator. However if any sort of contract was signed and that mentioned work for hire, or basically detailed that the work was to be owned by the company rather than Fred then Fred can't distribute this. Even if Fred does own the code it is not wise to distribute something built as part of a contract without agreement. It's not good for references and future work.<br>
<br>Re the GPL. Building on top of the GPL is fine and you don't have to distribute it at all. The only thing the GPL does is make you ship the license and original stuff along with your new product if you distribute that product. That's a gross simplification. But in essence if this work was done to go on a website then that is most likely not distributing the work as the website delivers the output of the work, not the work itself.<br>
<br>Fred should get agreement first to be safe in my opinion..<br><br><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">2009/7/13 Nir Aides <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:nir@winpdb.org">nir@winpdb.org</a>></span><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<div dir="ltr">This is an interesting legal problem.<br><br>According to the GPL, your work is derived from software covered by the GPL and therefore the client can not give you a copy of the source under any terms other than the GPL even if they own the copyright to the part of the work created by you.<br>
<br>Now, you have a copy of the source (since you created it) by permission (which may be irrelevant) of the client. <br>Therefore the copy you have is governed by the GPL and it is illegal of the client to prevent you from distributing it under the GPL.<br>
<br>Some people might look at this problem and trivially dismiss it because of such and such, but I wonder if it can be trivially dismissed.<br><br>The interesting thing is that there are a lot of transactions and business based on similar relationships between developers and clients. The consequences of this problem can therefore be huge.<br>
<br>This is not the only problem with the GPL. There are other fundamental problems such as the problem of determining and maintaining ownership of copyright of Free Software projects.<br><br>I would love to hear the opinion of a legal expert on this.<br>
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<br>Nir</font><div><div></div><div class="h5"><br><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, Jul 13, 2009 at 11:53 AM, Fred Jones <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:fredthejonester@gmail.com" target="_blank">fredthejonester@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
We have one client for whom we wrote a set of custom modules. I asked<br>
the client if we could put the modules on d.o and he balked. I tried<br>
to explain that he'll get good testing and also bug fixes and new<br>
features maybe, if others post patches etc.<br>
<br>
He feels that he (his organization that is) paid for the work and why<br>
should someone else now benefit? He also has this idea that other<br>
organizations like his will want a site like his and he has plans to<br>
provide a hosted service for them (while this idea may seem<br>
far-fetched, I do think he has some connections which might make this<br>
idea feasible).<br>
<br>
So he thinks if we release the code, then they will just grab the code<br>
and use it. I tried to explain that your average layman has no idea<br>
what Drupal is, no way to figure out your site is running Drupal, and<br>
if even he got that far, he has no way of building his site without a<br>
professional to put the pieces together (after they figure what those<br>
pieces are of course), and then they he would do just as well to use<br>
our hosted plan!<br>
<br>
But he hasn't accepted this. Are there any good arguments we can use<br>
to persuade him? I feel he has nothing to lose in releasing the code,<br>
but we have to convince him of that.<br>
<br>
Thanks.<br>
</blockquote></div><br></div></div></div>
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