[consulting] Copyright

[Jeremy Weiss]

>From Circular 9, by the US Copyright Office (www.copyright.gov/circs/circ09.pdf)

 

Under the 1976 Copyright Act as amended (title 17 of the United States Code),

a work is protected by copyright from the time it is created in a fixed form. In

other words, when a work is written down or otherwise set into tangible form,

the copyright immediately becomes the property of the author who created it.

Only the author or those deriving their rights from the author can rightfully

claim copyright.

Although the general rule is that the person who creates a work is the author

of that work, there is an exception to that principle: the copyright law defines a

category of works called “works made for hire.” If a work is “made for hire,” the

employer, and not the employee, is considered the author. The employer may

be a firm, an organization, or an individual.

To understand the complex concept of a work made for hire, it is necessary

to refer not only to the statutory definition but also to its interpretation in cases

decided by courts.

 

 

Basically, I've always been told by various attorney's that unless my agreement with a client specifically stated that it wasn't a work for made for hire situation, then it was. YMMV, IANAL, etc.

 

-jeremy 

 

 

 

From: consulting-bounces at drupal.org [mailto:consulting-bounces at drupal.org] On Behalf Of George Lee
Sent: Saturday, April 24, 2010 7:55 AM
To: consulting at drupal.org
Subject: [consulting] Copyright

 

Hi,

When folks are doing contract work developing modules, is it typical to retain copyright over code or to give copyright to the folks who are contracting out to you? Do folks have legal contract language for both scenarios?

Peace, community, justice,
- George

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