Apple Claims Ownership of Shareware

(54)T-Dub writes "Cricket Media recently released 'Netflix Fanatic', an OSX based shareware app that lets you manage your rental queue without logging on to Netflix. An article on Think Secret reveals the reason behind it's mysterious disappearance. Apparently the developer's employer, Apple, has claimed ownership over the application's name and source code. The developer claims that under Section 2870 of the California Labor Code this is illegal. The law states that if a company has an employment agreement with provisions saying employees must assign the rights of their inventions to their employer, those sections do not apply if the employee developed it on his or her own time, without using the employer's equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information. Within Apple, there's unsubstantiated speculation that Apple wants to include the Netflix Fanatic code in a new version of Sherlock." Also, they're presumably not too worried with employee morale.

Comments

Re:Program under a psudoname

[Alan Partridge]

PSEUDO

CORPORATE

www.your-spelling-sucks.com

Re:Other Laws?

[Alan Partridge]

And who are you?

Re:Apple, what's your problem?

[IdleTime]

Well, as I have said for years (and to deaf ears in the community), Apple is just as bad as any other major corporation in the software business.

Let's do an experiment!

Substitute Apple with Microsoft and we'll see how many people would be screaming then!. Just because the company is called Apple and is viewed as something like a saint in the community, people go out on a limb to make up excuses for them. Wake up! Just because theire boxes are considered sexy, doesn't make them A-OK. I will never ever own a product from such a monopolistic company as Apple.