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Property Rights and the MSDN PDA Give-Away?

Posted by Cliff on from the possession-being-9/10ths-of-the-law dept.

An anonymous reader asks: "MSDN subscribers recently qualified for a free Viewsonic V37 PDA (supposedly, around 25,000 units were given away). The software development group, at my company, just received our shipments; however, now there is contention between the developers and the company over who owns the PDAs. The company I work for (a worldwide information technology and services company) contends that that they own the PDAs because they were obtained through a subscription purchased by the company and, therefore, the PDAs are company property (and so all company policies governing the use of their property applies). This upset quite a few developers in my group who were excited to have a new gadget to work/play with and now any tinkering must be approved by the company. So, who owns the PDAs -- the developers who found out about the promotion, filled out the forms, paid for the stamps, on their own initiative, etc. or the company who purchased the MSDN subscriptions to make the developers eligible for the 'free' promotion? Also, I am curious to find out if others are having similar debates at their respective companies. Details of the offer can be found here."

5 of 95 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Get a new company by Kizzle · · Score: 2, Funny

    Quit your job good thinking. Ok everyone we don't need to comment on the article anymore, this guy has it figured out. I have to go and quit my job now because we ran out of staples.

    --
    Hacker Media
  2. Be happy.... by HotNeedleOfInquiry · · Score: 3, Funny

    They didn't round up all the units and sell them on ebay. I can think of a couple of companies that would.

    --
    "Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
  3. Geez, haven't figured out the answer yet? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Just make it fair to everybody. Split each PDA in half and the company
    will get half of each PDA and the person who won it gets
    the other half of the PDA.

    Geez, like that was tough to figure out.

  4. Re:All together now..... by Pete+(big-pete) · · Score: 2, Funny

    And "Microsoft Inflatable Girlfriend"? **Insert BSOD joke here.**

    I was thinking more along the lines of an uptime joke myself...

    -- Pete.

    --
    Monochrome - Probably the UK's largest internet BBS
  5. An old joke I coined whilst working for Sema by stephenbooth · · Score: 2, Funny

    UNIX boys keep it up longer but Windows will go down on you regardless.

    Stephen

    --
    "Don't write down to your readers, the only people less intelligent than you can't read" - Sign on Newspaper Office Wall