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"Future Tech" vs KDE Developer
I've been a huge fan of Liquid for some time. I've been compiling releases and using on my laptop. The project isn't nearly as ambitious as Enlightenment, but it has some interesting UI ideas and it looks good. I was really pleased when I found out that Mosfet was going to have a shot at continuing the development of the program for FT under the KDE License. At this point, FT ("The Total Linux Company," according to their website) mentioned a few of the features in Liquid as being part of the benefits of FT's distribution. This was to set them apart from "Other" distributions, although even at the time I found it funny, as The final decision in selecting one RPM based distribution over another would rarely be tipped in favor of the one with translucent menus ;)
Anyway the Changelog contains the following line:
* Future Technologies' name has been removed. They hired me to do KDE development, but failed to pay me after promising to do so three times over the span of several months :( I still haven't seen any of the paychecks they said they would send me, and they even went as far as sending me a fake FedEx number. Now they are saying they can't afford to pay their employees.
And soon after Mosfet's website announced that he was leaving Linux and Liquid was dead. Unable to afford to develop Liquid for free, he was seeking work in the windows world.
According to the site, on 10/28, Dr. Giovanni asked Mandrakesoft, the host of Mosfet.org to take down the site, under threat of legal action. But since I see the site still there, it looks like they are standing their ground which is a good thing.
Anyway, I don't know what the moral of the story is, beyond a warning to keep both eyes open. There is a lot of questionable stuff that goes on in this world. Be careful.
(I've emailed Giovanni from FT but have yet to hear back from him.)
If the story is true, isn't it interesting that they can't afford to pay this guy for his work but they can afford the legal costs to sue him? Or maybe they got a lawyer to take it on contingency. If they won the lawsuit, would they have to pay him out of their winnings?
This is a sad case of an open source software developer getting burned by companies promising large and delivering little. It just shows how important it is to keep control of your intellectual property until the checks roll in.
If I went to work for a company and they didn't pay me, I would just quit. If they really needed me, they would pay.
Seems to me that, if the facts are as stated, Mosfet has a clear mechanic's lein on the software. If it was done as a work for hire, and he was not paid, then he owns the copyright free and clear.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Even if their was a contract involved.. I'm sure is included getting paid... if they breach contract then the contract is null and void.. so they have nothing to do legal action with.. this is rediculous.
Also, who needs KDE or Gnome anyway? Enlightenment's all ya need. All those "features" just get in the way of doing stuff.
Carl
Vote Libertarian
Vote Libertarian
Now we know what the geek equivalent of a soap opera is... What next? Will RMS jump in and change the changelog to read GNU/something? Stay tuned!
This also reminds me why I would have to be hogtied to watch a soap opera... Ugh, boring social interaction--thank God for the internet!
I beleive Mosfet has a right to sue FT for making downloads of FTLiquid available even though they haven't paid him for his work. He should still retain the copyrights to his work and be able to control the distribution of it. Or does that not play in the Open source framework?
It's a shame that a decent dude lost his apartment, had a sore ass, and has to deal with a loser CEO.
Good luck Mosfet, maybe we should start a charity fund.
he was under with FT. Why kind of IP rights were given out and taken etc. If they had no paid him... I would assume they broke thier end of thier contract and have no right to his IP, developed for them or not. Maybe I am missing the point. . . .
"Anyway, I don't know what the moral of the story is, beyond a warning to keep both eyes open. There is a lot of questionable stuff that goes on in this world."
In other words, if someone offers to pay you to develop free software, chances are that you will get totally screwed along the way.
This company (Future Tech) commits fraud by not paying an employee for his work, and then THEY sue HIM when he tells them to pound sand??!!
Something seems very wrong here.....very wrong indeed.
I haven't been /.'ing long, is a troll a good thing or a bad thing? ^_^
I'll Sig you!
If this were all closed source (proprietary) tech, then there would be no such thing as a changelog, or it would be internal, and also proprietary.
Goat sex free since 2001
http://www.futuretg.com/
Their site looks like it's been designed by a group of kids for a school project.
Liquid is very damn cool though, if you don't mind wasting some cpu cycles for your eye's pleasure :)
give me all your garmonbozia
Mosfet is maybe a good programmer - but he surely doesn't know either to do person to person work (meaning - to keep business relationships straight and know how to work with people "above" him)...
Go ahead - ask any KDE developer about Mosfet behavior, how he cannot accept responsibility with deadlines (no mosfet, you cannot add big features after freeze and after everyone submitted everything!), how he leaves projects dead in the cold after he started them (remember Pixie? his daily desktop screenshot maybe? etc..) and how he's kicked out of every job (Mandrake, thekompany, and others who simply didn't want to hire him because his 5 years old behavior)
So no, I don't know the story exactly about his relations with Future Technologies - but if I might guess - he managed once again to piss off few people there...
MOSFET - GROW UP!
YoGy
why don't we all send Emails registering our disgust. Also, as a protest we could keep the sites /.ed. See how long this little company lasts then.
of companies with self-signed certificates!
-Peter
I also think this morom is violating the gpl, so someone should be suing his ass.
Are there styles available for KDE 2.2 other than Liquid? I'd like to see something a bit more innovative than his rip off of Mac OS X. What others are available and is there a website that features them?
David
IANYL
I Am Not YOUR Lawyer?? Are you saying you're a lawyer, just not the lawyer for nmilford?
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
Maybe Apple should sue all of them for creating another bland copy of their stuff. For god's sake, why don't these people try to create something original for once?
maybe they call themselves Future Tech because whenever you ask about the salary, they talk in the future tense
.
Mosfet should look at the fine print of his contract to make sure he has fulfilled all of his obligations, including notification of his employer that they had breached the contract and that he was severing it. With common contractual provisions in place, it's quite possible that Mosfet himself could be found in breach of contract, if he did not submit a formal WRITTEN letter to his employer (at a contractually defined postal address) notifying them of their failings and his cancellation of the contract. BTW: has Mosfet also submitted a bill? If Mosfet hasn't precisely adhered to the contract himself, he may find himself effectively trading his failure(s) for his employer's and wind up with zilch, nada, nothing in return.
I've seen a few of these disputes with ex-employees. In many cases, the ex-employee posts material that is inaccurate (or even downright lies). Even so, the company can only hurt itself by getting into a public debate, and usually is advised to avoid this.
Of course, it is also possible the facts are exactly as he stated. Without more information, you just can't tell.
Dr. Giovanni is not a Dr, he is a fraud. He has none of the qualifications he states
Some of their FTOSX snap shots seem to suggest that you can play Sorenson videos right off the web without using CrossOver!
That is not the issue!
Future Tech hired the man. He does some work, they fork over some money. Plain and simple.
Companies can't get away with acting like kids, i.e. "Hey, this guy really is a pain in the ass, let's just NOT pay him for his work".
If the company doesn't want to pay him, fine, then why don't they just fire him?
...fight Apple to the death. The Liquid looks very much like Aqua (aqua = liquid, get it?). Apple may let it go if it is just a couple of people doing an Aqua clone theme for fun, but once money is involved they will likely sue. I don't see it as a smart move if Future Tech try to claim ownership of it. After all Apple did spend lots of time and money on this new look of OSX, I think it is within their right.
Maybe Mosfet should try to get a contract with Apple to "port" the Aqua look over to KDE, Enlightenment, etc.
Codeala - Just another mindless drone
What's not to trust about a company with all of those penguins on their homepage?
Yes! See www.kde-look.org
Did anyone notice the "Utilities" CD that FT is offering? This is a direct ripoff of the rather popular Wimp32 software "Norton Utilities". I hope that FT's legal counsel is on a retainer, because if Symantec sees that web page they will tear FT a new Osshole.
Darl
Look, no one in business thinks that IBM or MS or HP or whomever is one big happy family, but at least those companies manage to keep many of the food fights from breaking out into the public. The open source companies and kiddies aren't happy unless they're telling the whole bloody world about every little slight and what they did in retaliation. To the adults of the world it looks like a bunch of kids who haven't learned to behave themselves in public.
Having said all that, I hope Mosfet sues FT's ass off.
The enlightenment link cdrtaco put up is not for the window manager....
.com
its www.enlightenment.org, not
Come on, who didn't burst out laughing when they saw Future Tech's website?
This may be slightly offtopic, but my thought came about because of how one problem with a developer can cascade into problems for other people, organizations, and companies.
:)
What if somebody began contributing code to the Linux Kernel? It might take a while for them to develop a good reputation, but perhaps over a year or two make a number of important contributions to the system. Then after they've thoroughly integrated their code into the kernel it turns out that their code violates somebody's intelletcual property. Be that copyright, patent law, etc. How would that effect the Kernel?
What I was considering is that this might be a back door tactic that somebody like Microsoft could use. If they could get people to infest the kernel with copyrighted and patented code it could really hose up the works it seems.
I don't know the feasibility of such an attack, but I figured I'd throw it out there and see what people think. Please feel free to gun down my post
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
This shit happens every day. Maybe it's time for an Open Source blacklist?
(not that I'd want to have anything to do with it.)
http://www.futuretg.com/FT/contact.html
LOL, odd isn't it, the really swish building is 'under setup' and their current premise sis a shit hole.
I for one am glad that they pissed off mosfet, I've been waiting for continued development of Liquid for quite sometime. Go Mosfet!
Witnesses stated that this Red Cross station exploded much more strongly than expected, implying that there was more there than wheat and blankets. Other sources state that the Taliban, have started using mosques, hospitals and NGO properties to hide in and store arms, to avoid bombing.
"that's not encryption - it's a new perl script that I'm working on..." - from some Matrix parody
you give this guy a +4 interesting??? he said nothing that anyone with an IQ of 70 didn't know already. oh wait, maybe that is why you modded him the way you did.........
I especially like the Noatun skin section, I had no idea that there were such cool skins out there that Noatun could use. Now if only Noatun would stop skipping and get more playlist features, it would be better than XMMS.
Oh, and for a cool wallpaper no matter what desktop you are using, try this artful take on a crash :-)
main(c,r){for(r=32;r;) printf(++c>31?c=!r--,"\n":c<r?" ":~c&r?" `":" #");}
If I understand this correctly, FT made a contract with Mosfet to pay him to code specific software. He performed his part of the bargain, but they breached the contract.
Now THEY claim that they are going to sue!? If anything, HE should be suing THEM. Given their bad faith threats he'd have a good chance at getting more than actual damages.
By the way, it sounds a whole lot like he's an independent contractor instead of an employee, so unless their contract is written and explicitly signs the copyright over, even if they do pay him, he still owns the copyright. See CCNV v Reid.
irrelevant tangent is the phrase that comes to
mind.
Maybe he should get sued by Apple.
I'd like statistics on which happens more often - Linux folk trashing everything Apple does, or Linux folk immediately turning around and ripping off as much as they can from Apple. This theme could have been called "kOS X".
It's no wonder that they "can't pay their employees", they're charging $49.95 for a beta version of the FTOSX. Not only are they not going to sell enough of these to pay for a developer to build anything, they aren't going to come close to paying a legal team to fight the OSX name usage battle.
They also have attorneys on staff, and will work with law firms in other cities if it comes to a lawsuit and you need local representation.
They take 20%, which is quite a bit, but note that they specialize in large business collections.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
Once in awhile a story comes along that warrants mention just so that people know to be careful.
I will be careful. Please keep posting more stories about chronic problem programmers, so we can avoid hiring them. I used to only be able to get this kind of info at MyCIO.com, but now Slashdot is doing it for free. Even us PHB types sneak into Slashdot every now and then, it's just like checking the weather. Everyone wants to know when the snow is coming.
Edith Keeler Must Die
About the only thing I see in Future Tech's future is a big fat lawsuit from Apple. Check this out:
http://www.FutureTG.com/FTOSX/
It also appears that they were unable to pay a web designer.
Need Free Juniper/NetScreen Support? JuniperForum
Copyright? No.
Trademark? Yes.
For example. Lamborghini (spelling, what's that?) has a trademark on their particular red, and no other car can look that way. Only Lamborghini-licensed shops can buy the auto-paint in that color.
Certain aesthetic design features are also TMed, but that's another story.
And by the way, people gets screwed in Windows World too. Seems to me that the "Windows World" is seen more and more like the El Dorado of no problems and easy money. Let me tell you it's not like that. Business is full of sharks, OpenSourced or not.
Isn't he the evil guy from Pokemon?
Am i the only one that finds strange that the topic si GOOGLE? :)
Meaby the author found the story on google.com?
http://securityportal.com.ar
Why the hell is the above post offtopic, its a matter of credibility that their html sucks.
Apple can't stop you from doing anything, so long as you don't give it away.
Steven Poldge (spelled wrong? if so, sorry Steve.) of Epic Games programmed the original Quake bot, the reaper bot. It was a closed source project, and expressly forbid the redistribution of his bot or source code.
This didn't stop people from hacking and re-releasing, especially to fix the infamous QC1.01 "disapearing weapon" bug, but technically, Steven could have sued - and he would have won.
This doesn't mean that in the privacy of your own home you couldn't hack the reaper - or anything else for that matter - yourself and use it for your own personal use, but that dosn't give you the right to distribute it.
The same applies to intellectual property.
Desperation is a stinky cologne
If there is no written contract and if he has received no payments, they probably don't have a legal leg to stand on. Why any of this is relevant to Slashdot, I don't know, however.
For another exciting episode of "As the Hard Drive Turns"! Open-Source soap opera at its finest..
Different countries have different laws for handling this sort of situations. Here in Finland, the state quarantees the salary of workers, if the employer is unable to pay it. I think this requires that the company has been filed for bankruptcy.
Future Tech seems to be an Italian company, with a branch in US, and Mosfet appears to live in US too, so I guess this would be handled according to US law (read the work contract and check the employment and contract laws). Somehow I doubt that US government would quarantee salaries in bankruptcy situations.
I don't have a faintest idea about Italian law, and I don't think there's an EU directive for this situation.
IANAL
did you look at the web site? looks like a "linux one" company to me. (what ever happened to those guys, anyway?)
i'd wager that the "threat to sue" is a letter from some lame-ass lawyer. thsoe are a dime a dozen, and not worth the paper they're printed on. a scare tactic, pure and simple. ignore it and get on with your life.
if they really haven't paid the developer, he should welcome the chance to go to court against them. countersue for defemation and get punitive damages.
I don't know if the QPL is considered Open Source (...), but the QPL is listed under free software licenses (although GPL-incompatible) on the various licenses list at the GNU website
Because Mandrake (or whoever hosts) doesn't think the company can afford the legal costs involved in a lawsuit of this nature--they can't even afford to pay their own employees, which is pretty much corporate death. Here in Canada, you pay your employees, or the creditors get to wait second in line. Period.
I don't imagine it's much different in many places in the states..
... who closed down their company to avoid paying a lot of people. And all right before the august holiday, leaving people with problems to find new jobs. A lot of Italian developer got burned by these guys: Jens Arnold and Raphael Leiteritz. Goes to show that shady business dealings are international.
Hi Everyone,
... But he continues to work on its ideas, and the software he made was generally offered for free. He moves from GPL to QPL.
... or I will publish on my website that you don't pay me".
... Then, he send a 6,300 US$ invoice and all the software he wrote was available for free to everyone!
...Sorry. I don't pay in these conditions.
... You call him ... and he do fire to the office.
... and this chapter finish here.
This morning here in Venice (Italy) there are great Sun and seems to be a great day.
I want to resume quickly the story about Mosfet and my company.
In June, I visit the Mosfet website (http://homepage.interaccess.com/~mosfet/) and I see some strange photos, similar to the actual photo is on Mosfet.org.
Inmmediately I offer money to him, because I suppose that their job was not on computer, however he start to work for us.
I send to him different jobs missions TODO, on this and on another matter.
Only one time, in one month and half he send and complete one task I send to him, all the rest and missions was not completed.
Never, we write an agreement. I don't know was he expect to be paid, and ask him.
He ask US$ 25 for hour and send an invoice for 6,300 US$, for 219 hours in one month and half.
I promise him to be paid. After this, he start to apply a politic like: "Or you pay me
Its Website (Mosfet.org) was empty for a while and the last Saturday, again he publish this notice.
Yes. I contact MandrakeSoft, because the Website is hosted by us (check Network Solutions) to shutdown the system. He work for them in the past. I don't know if they Mandrake and Mosfet, may some play on my company.
However, I don't pay him, simply because this guy works, only the matter he haves in its brain. If you ask some job, he said wait.
Several times I speak with him about its future, always by e-mail, trying to move him to an educational frame, inside my company.
I suppose that he is a great genius but also an "bomb-employee", in the sense now happens this (first month, first invoice). In the future may happens anything
Now, I want to close this matter in an clear and efficient mode, open also to him.
All the OpenSource stuff belong to FutureTechnologies (not Technology) and we will be pay this invoice.
We, FT, will support any further development, and offer for free, on Websites under our control, not controlled by other Linux companies or by employees.
No attorneys will be contacted
I want express my thanks to the time and efforts to visit our Websites and send emails.
Thanks,
Giovanni
I don't know about this place. Seems like those old dodgy linux startups we used to hear about when there was more ready money in the linux world.
I surfed over to the site as one of the comments mentioned that it was somewhat funny and tried to go to the store to see what their products would be. Konqueror halted me telling me that their certificate is self-signed and thus may not be trustworthy
Sure enough, the Certificate and the Issuer have the same address, email contact, everything!!
"And soon after Mosfet's website announced that he was leaving Linux and Liquid was dead. Unable to afford to develop Liquid for free, he was seeking work in the windows world."
Yet the page says: "The good news is I've made up my mind, I'm back coding again, and mosfet.org is being redesigned and will never die despite the efforts of companies like Future Technologies.".
It also says that "I've started working for a Windows-based software company".
That's not the same thing as leaving Linux (I know many people that work in Windows enviroments just because it's easy to find jobs even though they prefer to use other OS'es).
I am Italian, and I've been keeping an eye on the Linux scene for the last 6-7 years. But it's the first time I hear about this company, Future Technology, which is also based in a very small town (close to Slovenian border)... I would have double-checked the company records before accepting a contract with them, it's very strange Mosfet ended up a job there.
"It is more complicated than you think" (The Eighth Networking Truth from RFC 1925)
What? And perpetuate hate, spite and the use of force? If you do that - if you become like that - you lose instantly. Not just this battle, but the whole war.
Reading between the lines, both Future and Mosfet are behaving like losers. Mosfet has a history of being difficult to deal with (but creative, nevertheless), Future have a similar reputation as a denial-of-reality get-rich-quick company. A match made in hell. A good thing to steer clear of, not inflame.
If you disagree, post a reply using your real name. I'd also rather see a reply than a moderation.
-- Want to fight terror? Why go to Afghanistan? Why not start at home?
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
This is not the first time Mosfet huffed and puffed. He has done it to KDE. Not once, but twice. In a smaller way, he did it to Mandrakesoft. Now he did it to Future Technologies. I am a big KDE advocate. I also use Mandrake Linux. I follow what happens with the KDE Community, and it is apparent that Mosfet has serious "mood swings."
I would assume that he's hiding something, just because of his rep.
Works better visually.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
... that it is so easy to be judged and then placed in the central square for the ritual tomato throwing.
I mean, come on.... if it is true, then by all means, string them up by their balls. But where is the proof?
What if I put up a page where I said that Slashdot hired me, and then refused to pay me - would you run that story? If I said it was Microsoft then? I thought so.
Maybe you know a lot about this guy, things that are not mentioned around here, but so far, all I see is this guy ranting about he didn't get any money from this company. Which may, or may not be true.
Of course, we want it to be true, so we can point our finger at, and hopefully ruin this bad, bad company. What if this guy is lying then? Slashdot is in no way almighty, but it does have some impact on the linux world, or at least we would like to think so. It is not nice to write such about a company that may be struggling without any proof.
So, where is the proof?
No other comment.
--
Anonymous
Without having read too much, I can assure you that this Giovanni character is evil to the core. According to my sons, he is responsible for the reprehensible actions of "Team Rocket" and directed the research that lead to MewTwo!
I understand that the quest for the ultimate Chinpokomon is important and we all must destroy the evil power. So this Giovanni guy must be shamed out of the Chinpokomon arena forever.
But please do not be angry with me. I have a very small penis. It's not huge like your penis...
Hey, maybe Mandrakesoft should give Mosfet a job to continue the development of the liquid skin..
This is a very cool theme and it would be a real, real shame if it ceased development.. Mandrakesoft would also keep a great programmer in a career developing open source.
You mean, "reins", don't you?
Peter
It just goes to show, just a little static can fry a Mosfet. ;o)
I know this is a sad thing but. Mosfet went into this with the intent of making money from the start. KDE doesn't want people that are not team players. Mosfet should have put an application in at MicroSoft. Then he would have got what he wanted.
You don't go publicly badmouthing a company and burning your bridges because of private business dealings gone sour. That's what you'd expect from a 14 year old who hasn't been around.
Yes, if your reasoning is twisted enough, the US is the number one cause of terrorism, and no matter what it does, it cannot escape that position.
.5-2% of their GDP *yearly*.
:)
As the worlds most powerful nation, it can be blamed for anything and everything, for doing actions, for not doing actions, for each and every action of commerce or trade it does or doesn't do.
Those who do no such trade, those who have no power are few lucky people who cannot be blamed for being terrorists. Because of their powerlessness.
IE, those with power are also the ones with the greatest percentage of international interactions, even if they have a lower percentage of 'evil interactions', they may still end up responsible for a great share of international strife. Not because of their innate evilness but just because they are involved in so many places and so many ways.
As for random other statistics, a couple of thousand Afghan *infants* die a week, even before this recent hell. (Computed from population, birth rate and infant mortality rate statistics taken from CIA world factbook.)
Are we terrorists for not helping to save the poor children. Do keep in mind that we've been sending enough aid to account for
The US sucks, and screws up, but don't fall into the trap of automatically blaming the powerful for all deeds by confusing the 'rate of misdeeds' (#misdeeds/#interactions) with the 'absolute number of misdeeds'. For example, there are more airplane crashes a year, even though the accident rate is slowly falling, based soley on the number of flights increasing.
If you argue that the US is responsible for a the largest share of misdeeds, I could believe it.
I won't believe without more evidence a claim that we have a high rate of misdeeds. There are too many petty dictators destroying their populations, or their neighbors populations for me to believe that the US is anywhere near the top of that list.
It is fallacious reasoning to blame the US for everything just because it is involved in everything. A big fish makes a lot more eddies swimming gently than a sperm swimming frantically.
Scott
PS: got a reference on the statistic of only being 2500 deaths?
PPS: And, better take this to email.
Yep,
he dares suggest a site better than themes.org (which remindes me of a broken yo-yo - it goes down but doesn't come back up).
themes.org is an OSDN site, so cmdrtaco will soon moderate you down to -5.
Like FTKDE, and FTMandrake, and FTRedhat, and FTOSX, which I don't really understand, since they are bundling a 68k mac emulator with it, nothing which is capable of powerpc apps.
Really weird, they apparently are just a bunch of crack pots who figured they could sell some marketing buzz to businesses: "How would you like to use this new, hot linux thing? Our version is everything everyone else's is, but it looks cooler?"
Idiotic, really
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
how is this a +5 interesting?
The last sentence deserves a +5 funny, but the rest deserves a -1 inaccurate.
Mosfet's experience with Future Technology sounds just like my experience with Catharon Productions, Inc..
Of course, I'm stupid/naïve enough to buy the "we're getting funding from our new investor in two weeks!" line for long enough that I can't send the Ontario Ministry of Labour after them (New York State Dept. of Labor says the can't do anything because I did the work in Canada). I really should've sent the lawyer after them earlier (that's my only recourse, hooray I'm so happy)...
Massive bad taste in my mouth, if I end up being a contractor ever again I'm going to be such an asshole while negotiating the contract (pay me within 2 weeks or you've got compound interest; fail to pay in 4 weeks and you're talking to a lawyer, etc.) that I won't get hired.
Nothing like getting told "we prefer to pay the people who are still working for us." Bastards. I'm so glad I worked hard to finish up my stuff and leave it in a good state before I bailed.
- chrish
I find it semi-amusing that FutureTech chooses to issue their own security certificate...
I guess it's imperative that you have a secure connection to see what kind of products they offer.
I think, therefore I am an Atheist.
It doesn't take a genius to see that if they don't have money to pay employees for work that's already been completed, then they sure as hell don't have money to pay a lawyer to go after dubious legal claims.
Remember that in a bankruptcy situation (such as the one that this company is apparently headed toward), employees' pay is second in line only to taxes. Even if a lawyer takes this case on contingency and wins, he can't get any money from it until every last paycheck has been cut. He would never see the winnings from the suit.
No lawyer is going to touch that with a ten foot pole. There are plenty of paying customers to be found.
Michael
Do you have ESP?
...I will tell you that he is, personally, a very likable fellow. He is, however, a difficult person to do business with.
Our business relationship was short-lived but reasonably amicable. It ended because, with respect to the product, things just weren't going anywhere, and, as far as I could see, the prospects didn't look good.
I had the misfortune to do purchase a product from FT. As a result, I believe Mosfet in this scenario.
The product still hasn't arrived, several months after it's promissed date. If it were worth more, I would sue them. I suspect that they calculated on this. But the way they reportedly treated Mosfet is quite consistent with the way they treated me. And they still have the gall to send me ads.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
I've been doing contract work since 1994. A little work off and on for years before that, but we can ignore it. And less these days since I'm tied up with AdAce.
But with years of experience under my belt, I've had my share of disputes.
In order to protect your receivables, you have to take a very firm, very cruel stand right from the get go. There is absolutely no benefit in being even slightly merciful at the start, and a whole lot of harm. And if you take a hard stand, that gives you room to negotiate in trying to convince a client to pay up. You've gotta make sure that your client sees themselves lying in the way of a hurtling sisyphine rock, and you hold the key to the only way out of its path.
If you negotiate a contract for net 30 terms, and you haven't received a check 20 days after billing, send them a reminder. If you haven't received a check on the 30th day, submit a bad credit report. Don't wait. Do it. If you haven't received a check on the 40th day, file suit, and send a letter to your client telling them that you've done so. You can always drop the suit if the client finally pays. Be mean. Be cruel. Be a right bastard.
The finance and legal people at your client won't get offended: that's the way that they play the game too. Many accounts payable departments don't pay net 30 bills until the 30th day. You've gotta take a hard stand with them and make the point that net-30 means that they have 30 days to complete payment, not 30 days to start.
Don't be forgiving, don't be kind. If the client jerks you around in payment, you don't want to work for them again. I have occasionally accepted second jobs from bad clients, but I always insist on payment in advance for them. I keep a counter on one of my machines, tracking the available balance in their account. I leave it up to their people to track the balance and make sure it doesn't drop to zero, because when it does drop, I immediately stop what I'm doing.
If everything that Mosfet said is true, and if everything that the post from "Giovanni" here says is true, then Mosfet is being overly kind to Future Tech. He's not being petty. He's not suffering from a mood swing. He's not being an irresponsible worker who doesn't finish his tasks. He's being foolishly forgiving and naive.
Oh ya, almost forgot: always get a contract in writing, and always negotiate the terms. Never accept the first offer.
Years ago, I had a potential client in San Jose, California. They wanted someone to build them a consumer-level internet firewall machine, that Joe Blow could just plug in and run with. So they were soliciting proposals. We negotiated $50/hour for me to produce a proposal for them, which I did. Standard type of proposal, talking about the hardware, OS, and configured components that I would be using. He rejected it, saying that this isn't what he was used to getting, that out of a proposal he expected the complete texts of all configuration files, build scripts, the whole 9 yards. Well, of course I told him that that would constitute the entire contract, not just a project proposal, and I would require my full rate and 50 hours to do so. He tried to claim that all his previous contractors had complied, and my response was that it is not my concern what his previous contractors did or did not do; if they truly did comply, then they were naive, and really shouldn't be in this business at all. He didn't like that response. Finally after I threatened suit, he agreed to pay my fee for the proposal, but of course he didn't give me the project. Boo hoo. I've since discovered that this particular manager at this company (not the whole company: just that one manager) had been making a practice over many years before and since of taking overly detailed project proposals for free or cheap, rejecting the projects, and then using the recipe in the proposal to implement the project in house. He was adored by his bosses, because he always produced "his" projects far under budget. Ha. Small wonder. Then, as I and others spread the word through the contractors that we know here in the SF Bay Area, he started to fall from favor with his bosses. It seems that he was no longer able to finish projects at all, much less under budget. And those few projects that he did manage to finish were very poor quality. He's now been unemployed for 2 years. So you see, taking a firm stand and being a bastard gives you wonderful anectodes with happy endings. Not to mention that you actually get paid.
-- Nolite audere delere orbiculum rigidum meum.
Mosfet lives in the US. FT is located in an EU country.
;-)
Two very different law systems.
As a result, an international lawsuit would be very very expensive for both of them - AFAIK, FT doesn't have any office in the States (and isn't easily prosecutable): often the courts take the side of the person living in their jurisdiction (so, the US court would give reason to Mosfet and the european one to FT) with a (quite expensive) stalemate as a result.
However, in the country where FT resides, contracts by email, without a certified digital signature are like toilet paper, not usable in any lawsuit. And I don't think an european firm, without business in the States (AFAIK) would obey to an US court decision.
Sorry, Mosfet isn't likely to have any euro from them...at least he will have the satisfaction of revelating a bad business behaviour, because programmers of that country are getting wary of FT...
I love whistle blowers!
From http://www.linuxutilities.org/Why.html:
"Therefore, there are a lot of work to do, to simplify
At least I am confortable knowing they are as professional as slashdot!
"`Ford, you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.'" -THHGTTG
Good for Mosfet for moving on. I haven't used his work but I've run into his words out here and I respect him.
I'm a contract whore. Sometimes I get paid immediately and sometimes it's 30-days net. Whatever the arrangement, if it's more than a week late or if there are any problems with the check.... then all work stops until its cleared up. No exceptions. Anything else is working for a promise, which is not much better than working for free. It's happened before. I'm sure It'll happen again. You just pick yourself up and move on.
He. We have only one side of the story. This developer apparently has problem relating to anyone. He moves from A because of a dispute, to B where another dispute arises. Is this guy unlucky or ant-social?
What is this GUIK thing for Linux anyway. Linux is COMMAND LINE.
Cliff
MOSFET? Foreign?
Maybe he is, but that's got nothing to do with the name......
MOSFET = Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor.