Slashdot Mirror
Does Your Employer Own Your Thoughts?
MJ writes "Evan Brown has finally lost his 7 year court battle over ownership of thoughts in his brain. Judge Henderson of the 219th District Court in Collin County, Texas granted DSC Communications Corporation, Inc (now Alcatel, USA) a Final Judgement granting DSC ownership of Mr. Brown's idea of a reverse compiler that Mr. Brown claims to have begun formulating twelve years before his employment at DSC and during his off-time while at DSC. Mr. Brown has received media coverage in print, televion and on the Internet: The John Marshall Journal of Computer & Information Law, Wired, Computerworld. This rings similar to previous Slashdot articles on employer/employee IP rights."
I'd tell you what I think, but you're gonna have to ask my employer first.
...by refusing to think at work!
That's what happens when you don't wear your tinfoil hat.
Just because it's the law doesn't mean it's fair. Why is it a company can own my ideas, but I can't own their software? How about leasing our ideas?
Michalangelo Progr
...I do no thinking at work, or I'd be worried by this judgment.
Where I work (a well-known PC gaming company) employees must sign a document that basically states that any concepts and technology are developed while employed here are property of the company.
In some ways, corporate America really treats employees like slaves.
Maybe it's just me, but this reporting seems so onesided. Perhaps it all boiled down to a non-compete clause that specifically forbade the guy from personally developing products similar to and based upon products sold by the company?
Ideas can be owned if they are talked about AND you sign a paper that says they own you.
At the next eco-hypocrisy-meeting, count the private jets used to get to the meeting. Should be interesting to see that
Maybe I'm missing something here, but doesn't it say he's appealing the ruling and that the appellate court said that the Judge did not meet the requirements for a final judgement and have sent the case back down to the same Judge? ???
yes, the judge made a ruling, but judge's rulings get overturned all the time. Talk to me when it gets to the Supreme Court, mkay?
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
According to the article @ wired he signed a contract:
"The company said it owned Brown's idea because of a signed employment agreement requiring him to disclose any inventions he conceived of or developed while at the company."
Sadly right/wrong doesn't matter if it's legal...
Tell it to the patent office.
KFG
They refused to promote me to management.
There are plenty of employers out there with reasonable IP agreements to be had. Be sure to read the fine print, shop around for a company that's fair.
Frankly I think it's reasonable for a company to "own" my thoughts as related to the core business of that company, and any development activities that pertain to it.
However if my employer pays me for insurance database work and I'm writing a game in my spare time though, hell no, it's mine. And I won't sign on with any company that disagrees.
One large company I worked for asked me to declare any and all previous projects I wanted to claim as mine before I joined them. I just made it one long list, several existing and a dozen or two "someday" projects just in case. Cheap insurance.
Read carefully and work it to your advantage.
than citizens. I personally hope this gets appealed to SCOTUS- and then I say if they uphold corporate rights over citzenry, we take that as a sign that it's time for a new revolution.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Because I have a corporate past, some of my works must be published under a pseudonym. The honorable history of the "nom de plume" descends from this and other crazy rulings.
Does the record label own all the works of "Joe Skunk?" Fine, release your nest record as "Joseph Weasel" and they will never know.
Does your employer prohibit your publications without prior review, and rejects everything you say? Fine, publish under another name.
Does anyone remember the Ada language books by "Do While Jones?" They were published under a false name for just this sort of reason. (And, no, I am not Do While Jones.)
Moral? Say what you please, release what you will, but misdirect them as to who was saying it. Sometimes freedom comes with a strange price.
Soli Deo Gloria
Yeah, that fucker of a judge ruled that a legally binding contract was legally binding. What a bastard, going around upholding laws like that. Someone should fire him.
For the slow amongst you, yes that was sarcasm.
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
So you have the oportunity to avoid this when you sign up for employment with a new company that 'owns your thoughts' (or doesn't want you walking away from the company with an idea you derived as part of your job duties at the company). Whenever they have that clause it's common for them to have you identify your past inventions. Anything you think you may productize or is a work in your brain you should list here. If your item is on this list and your contract is like most your employer cannot lay claim to these 'previous inventions'.
And folks, FOLKS, don't sign anything you haven't read and don't understand. And if you don't like provisions in it, cross them out and initial it then sign it. There's nothing that says you have to accept their employment contract verbatim. Most HR folks won't bother to chase you down or make a big fuss if it's just 'fluff' wording anyway. Read your contract, sign it, and then accept the terms you have agreed to in writing.
We don't need more 'laws' to protect the 'poor workers' from their 'corporate enslavers', folks need to just not be f**kn p*****s when they accept a job somewhere. If the terms of employment are acceptable then take it, if not ask for different terms or look for a different employer. A job aint a handout, it's an arrangement with mutual benefit to BOTH employer and employee.
-- Greg
Slashdot, would a spell-checker for posting be too much to ask? It's not rocket science!
When I was hired by my current employer, they asked me to sign the same sort of agreement - stating that they owned anything that I developed before employment (if not named), and anything I developed during my employment. I balked and they quickly produced an alternate employment agreement which granted me rights to anything I developed on my own time and without using company equipment.
I suspect that this is fairly common practice. If you don't ask, they certainly won't offer (except in California, where I believe this is the law)
How can we continue to believe in a just universe and freedom to eat crackers if we have no ale?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Google encourages employees to use 1 day per week on their own hobby/project, does that mean...?
Uselessful technology (Air-Charged
Well IMO, when companies start claiming the rights to thoughts you have that aren't related to work you're doing for them, it's gone too far, regardless of what contract you signed.
This is bad precedent. I mean, once this is allowed to stand, then "thought police" become not only conceivable, but neccesary. That's too damned far. If the law is going to push us in this direction, then the law has outgrown its usefulness to a free people.
If Texans truly value their freedom, they have to revolt against this on some level. I'm not advocating armed revolt here either...
Think for yourself, destroy your television.
From a quick read of Evan Brown's web site it appears that the "unique idea" he claims is a decompiler. That is, a program that will take compiled binary code and convert it into some kind of source code. As an idea this does not seem to be terribly unique or profound. What is difficult is implementing this idea in working software.
Evan Brown claims that the company he has been in litigation with offered him $2 million for the rights to his "idea". Apparently he turned them down. According to the web site they then sued Mr. Brown claiming to own the idea anyway.
What I find ironic is that as an "idea" a decompiler is certainly not worth much. An actual implementation, that can be easily retargeted, might be worth $2 million, but it is not clear that this is what Mr. Brown had, or that he was capable of creating this kind of software. The guy was working as tester and debugger, not a compiler developer. His skills seem to have been hacking an existing software base, not creating new, complex software.
While I am sympathetic with Mr. Brown's David vs. Goliath fight, it does seem that his difficulties lie in being difficult. It seems like there must have been a way out of this other than years of litigation.
The case also seems to turn on Texas law. While I am tempted to make nasty comments about the state that elected G.W. Bush governor, I'll resist. After all he might be "elected" president and I would not want an all expense paid trip to the US resort in Cuba.
I will note that at least in California work that you do on your own time that is not related to your employers work belongs to you. And given the history of startup companies here, it also appears that in many cases you can use related work as long as you quit first.
Oh, and by the way, I have a compiler development background. I'd be happy to deliver a decompiler for $2 million...
There's one big exception though. If you developed any of your invention rights on company time or used company resources (even if allowed), your employer has rights if you signed one of those agreements.
You know, I always took that aspect of Ayn Rand's books (esp. Atlas Shrugged) to be great in theory, but not directly applicable to the real world.
Then I was fighting someone at work who had put us into a really awkward and inappropriate situation, not by mistake or sheer incompetence, but because he knew we'd make it work no matter what.
When I pointed out what he'd done, and that while we COULD fix it, we SHOULDN'T, he said "You're being theoretical. You need to deal in practical reality."
That phrase is a common one in those books, and one I always felt was over-the-top and would never be uttered in the real world. Surprise!
This is only relevant because so many of her characters did just what the previous poster suggests -- stop thinking and working for those who would make it harder to work and think, even while profiting from the fruits of that thought and labor.
Or, as Scott Adams said in one of his books (paraphrasing) -- what if a coworker jumped out a high window, not because he was suicidal, but because he thought it was a great shortcut to the parking lot. Do you catch him, thus affirming his decision (and thus ensuring he will repeat it), or do you let him drop and suffer the consequences of your inaction?
This reminds me of the credit card applications. People sign them without reading the fine print and act suprised when they get raped with various fees and high interest rate.
While I'm not condoning this type of behavior, we need to start thinking about the rights that we sign away everyday for the mighty dollar.
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
Most development processes tend to be continuous and interwoven. You have an idea about a problem at work while your'e about to fall asleep at home. The next day you start the implementation at the office. While your'e at the office on hold you have an idea about a pet project and you do work at home. If your'e bored on a train or a plain to a customer you may go further.
From the companies viewpoint they are gambling. Their engineers may come up with little more than microsoft style innovations, or they may come up with blockbusters. Either way the engineers are usually getting paid a decent salary with benefits while they are there.
Its very difficult to draw the line at what a brain is doing and when. If someone comes up with product directly related to the companies business and what the employee is working on, they have a certain right to be suspicious of assertions that it was done on my own time.
From a civil rights perspective, and a social perspective, this may be something that should not be legal or at least regulated. You can't sell your vote, you can't be forced into contracts under duress, you can't be forced to give away right via a shrinkwrap agreement (though alot of people have done a good job of convincing people they can). Should an employer have the right to force their employees give up the fruits of their creative endeavors as a condition of employment. Employment is a tangible need for most people and forcing employees to agree to such contracts may constitute a form of coercion or duress.
There is of course the consequences to tilting this playing field either way. Tilting it to the employer can cause people to either just give away their work or not reveal it. Tilting things to the employee could cause the employer to shift hiring to a local where things are more in their favor.
Its not a simple issue. In this case there was almost certainly a few greedy assholes in the company, but they seem to turn up everywhere.
What ahppens when every company has a contract that says they own everything you think of, even before employment? Are we all suppose to starve, because thats what it comes down to, go hungry, or let the 'Corp' own everything.
It seems to me that shouldn'e be allowed and WE do need government intervention to maitain a balance.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Let's make some safe assumption shall we :
1. The majority of companies that operate in your field of work choose to apply the "I own your inventions" provision as standard in contracts.
2. But you oppose it, on the reasonable grounds that
a)being employed in one company doesn't imply that the company helped develop/conceive the
idea even if the product is sold in the same market.
b)the burden of proof of misappropriation should be on the company, there shouldn't be a burden on inventor who patented the idea, as he's potentially disclosing the idea to the world by patenting it.
3. Therefore, you find yourself out of 80-100% of your job's market and are indirectly forced to get another job, at least until you find some better company in your field (which may never happen)
I can't think of anything more chilling to innovation and invention then a provision that says "everything you haven't disclosed to us before is likely to be ours" ; who in his right mind would ever -think- about inventing something in his field of works, knowing that a previous employer may sue the hell out of him and win, only because of the amount of money they have and the amount you don't ?
It's the nature of human creativity, and it's almost impossible (and meaningless) to disentangle the two.
Clearly, blanket assignment of all "IP" (I hate that term) to the employer is not fair, but nor is it reasonable to argue that his private stuff is completely seperate.
A reasonable reward scheme for new ideas generated by employees would be the best idea - isn't that what IBM (and recently Microsoft) does? Basically you assign the patent to the company, but you are listed as the inventor and get a license income stream plus "invention bonus"...
Corporations have won their war against *the people*, on behalf of *some people*. Now they own your body while you're on the clock, and your mind while under contract. Only the 14th Amendment prevents them from owning your body off the clock, but drug tests carve out their niche in that protected realm, despite the 5th Amendment.
America was a political colony of an over-extended European monarch. We kicked him, and his antiquated system, out, but less than a century later, we created his corporate successor. Within a century of that evolution, we are now back where we started, but with a new, less beatable decentralized master. Where in the world are the new revolutionaries? Farthest from the centers of corporate power, most under its control, and therefore most aware of its tyranny; the most independent of those people will reach a threshold where they escape corporatism's hold, and establish a new order. Who are they?
--
make install -not war
I just signed on with Accenture in Illinois, and the contract I had to sign specifically stated anything I make on my own time withount using company resources is mine.
Apparently it's a state law. The lesson to be learned is don't work for IT in Texas.
On the other hand, this guy turned down $2 million for his idea. This isn't joe shmoe getting shafted, this is somebody being greedy and his company is playing hardball.
Use your eyeballs and your brain and RTFP (paperwork) before you accept a job. If you don't like what it says, DON'T TAKE THE JOB. It's that simple. I turned down two job offers because they had all-encompassing IP rights clauses in their policies. I finally found a great job with a great employer whose policy is "If we pay you to do it, it's ours. If it's related to the business unit that employs you, it's ours. Otherwise, we could give a flip."
We're even allowed to use company resources (computers, labs, etc) for personal projects so long as we ask our manager beforehand and get approval. I guess there are some good things about working for a huge company that has bigger things to worry about than the little widget you're coming up with in your dreams.
If you plan to work on anything related to your career outside of the company, create a corporation and work through it!! Companies don't write subcontract agreements that encroach on the sub's intellectual property, which is what you have! They write employment agreements that do.
If you plan on doing something with your ideas, then commit! Start an S-Corp, get some liability insurance, and have your "employer" pay you by invoice instead, and sub out your own payroll. You will NEVER be asked to give up your company's intellectual property by any business you truly want to work with.
Sure the opportunities are more slim, but hey, you're coming up with stuff on your own time, so put your money where your mouth is.
I did this and my client started with a subcontractor agreement that explicitly stated that my IP was my IP and their IP was theirs. It was refreshing.
Yes, Virginia, the laws are made to benefit the corporation. So Incorporate!
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
When I changed jobs recently, this was one of the top things on my mind. So I negotiated with the company to get the following clause into my contract (translated from Japanese):
Admittedly, I had the advantage that the company I work for now called me instead of me applying for a job, which gave me a fairly good bargaining position. But at least for smaller companies, where the company isn't too strangled in rules and standard procedures, something like the above shouldn't be too hard to work out--if you try.
I always cross out the unfair statements in any work agreement. Stop being sheep and do what you know is right. Your employer knows it's right too.
Nothing personal, your advice is great, but this drives me nuts. Why are corps so much better off then people? Kill a few dozen people, you get the death penalty. Lie about your product and kill a huge number of people, no problem keep selling tobacco.
The whole thing seems like a shell game rich people can play that people who can't afford lawyers can get burn if they try.
Sorry. Rant off.
Corporations are more important because they have more money.
The company I work for should only own my thoughts if they want to move from software into porn.
Some things cannot be contracted away. The classic example is the right not to be owned, ie be a slave.
This has not been strictly enforced over the years. For instance, Scientology's "Sea Org" (the navy/management/lifers) requires their services for this life and I believe a billion years of subsequent lives. I don't know how this contract'd be enforced, tho.
I am getting a little more frightened about the rightward ho-ing of the judiciary. Being pro-business is one thing, but letting them own our thoughts?
What happens when, sometime in the next 100 years, it will be technologically possible to monitor human thoughts? Will we be scanned at work to see if we are thinking anything worth owning? This is not reducing the concept to its absurd conclusion. I'm serious here.
The right to be secure in our person and possessions should be extended to add security from intrusion of our own damned heads! Screw property rights. Our minds are the only thing they can't own - today - but brick by brick they are prepping a truly unbreakable prison.
It doesn't pay to think at work.
Do not touch -Willie
In the future, all property will be owned by corporations, as their rights, and freedom from liability, dwarf that of humans. So everyone should have at least one corporation. Preferably multinational.
--
make install -not war
Personally I am in favor of the death penalty for corporations convicted of murder.
It is possible to incorporate without a lawyer. All you need to do is fill out some paperwork and file it with the government. Whether or not you use a lawyer I would still recommend doing your homework so you know what you are getting into.
Coding Blog
where an employee's personal inventions are
ALWAYS owned by the employee, NEVER by the
employer.
In the USA, the employer basically OWNS the
employee (and any useful employee thoughts.)
If I weren't such a dummy with the German
language (written & spoken), I might have
emigrated there long ago. Personal freedom
in the USA is rapidly slipping away, especially
with the "corporate national socialist" regime
in power today.
I disagree. In fact, what your company does is the exact reason a company hires you to provide services to them.
It's like this. You are a software developer. You write communication and telephone equipment software. You are hired by AT&T as a subcontractor to, what? Write telephone equipment software. You are not obligated to have them as your only client. You are also not obligated to give them everything your company creates.
Agreed that it's a different landscape of companies and services which you work with and perform. But then my response assumed the parent poster wasn't bs'ing about wanting to do something with stuff he created on the side.
At some point, if you have original ideas, you must create a company to sell them, if they are to go anywhere.
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
... and be prepared to negotiate.
When changing jobs recently, I was offered an onerous IP agreement. I manage to get it amended without too much hassle - and not just for me, but (I'm told) for all future employees. Having been through this a couple of times before, it seems to me that the authors of such agreements grab everything they can by default, and will just fall over at the least sign of resistance.
You do have to be prepared to walk away. If you're not able to decline (for financial reasons, for example) and sign the thing anyway you really have no right to complain later. At the very least you should be aware of what you're agreeing to, so at least then you can choose not to develop particularly valuable IP in your own time and with your own resources. I was amazed by the number of people working for my new employer that didn't even know what they had signed.
On the lack of noble manners. - Soldiers and leaders still have far better relationships with each other than workers and employers. So far at least, culture that rests on a military basis still towers above all so-called industrial culture: the latter in its present shape is altogether the most vulgar form of existence that has yet exisxted. Here one is at the mercy of brute need; one wants to live and has to sell oneself, but one despises those who exploit this need and buy the worker. Oddly, suibmission to powerful, frightening, even terrible persons, like tyrants and generals, is not experienced as nearly so painful as is the submission to unknown and uninteresting persons, which is what all the luminaries of industry are. What the workers see in the employer is usualy only a cunning, bloodsucking dog of a man who speculates on all misery; and the employer's name, shape, manner, and reputation are a mater of complete indifference to them. The manufacterers and entrepreneuers of business probably have been too deficient so far in all those forms and signs of a higher race that alone makes a person interesting. If the nobility of birth showed in their eyes and gestures, there might not be any socialism of the masses. For at bottom, the masses are wiling to submit to slavery of any kind, if only the higherups constantly legitimize themselves as higher, as born to commad - by having noble manners. The most common man feels that nobility cannot be improvised and that one has to honor in it the fruit of long periods of time. But the lack of higher manners and the notorious vulgarity of the manufacturers with their ruddy, fat hands give him the idea that it is only accident and luck that has elevated one person above another. Well then, he reasons: let us try accident and luck! Let us throw the dice! And thus socialism is born.
I don't read or respond to AC posts
Some of my brothers here have suggested, in many cases eloquently, that the law should not permit someone to divest their inventions as part of an employment agreement, or even to propertize their inventions at all in order to protect employees from overreaching employers.
This cuts both ways. Many of us would love to have jobs where we are hired to do nothing, but think, dream and invent. Such a law precludes the job from existing? Who would pay to have you think, dream and invent, if they weren't entitled to the benefit of that bargain?
Some have observed that for those of us who invent, we need merely refuse to sign these agreements and refrain from taking the jobs. Others responded that this is nice, in theory, but a practical impossibility for those who want to work -- You have to sign to get the jobs. . And of course, there is always the entrepreneurial route of inventing, finding investors and trying to make it on your own. The truth, of course, is somewhere inbetween.
But if we legislate against alienation of invention, then those of us who invent won't even have the option to refuse to sign the agreements -- the only thing we can do is to go the entrepreneurial route, and then only if we permit the inventor to assign the rights to his invention to the company (how else to raise capital?)
So, at the end of the day, it may well be that maintaining the right to assign the invention GIVES MORE OPTIONS, at least in theory, than laws that preclude it. For those of us who prefer not to take risks and to work for invention mills, the inability to alienate deprives us from exchanging large upside of our inventions for a regular paycheck and the ability to work in fun labs with smart people. For those of us who want to be risk-takers and innovators, we are free under both regimes, unless you go all the way and deprive me of a property right to my inventions and the ability to assign it.
In fact, markets shift. Sometime, smart people are in great demand -- as we were during the bubble. Other times, anybody with technical chops will do. We can call our shots when in demand, and not when we are not. Those of us who are not as good have fewer options. But I am not sure how employment law gives any of us any more options.
That said, I think statutory protections assuring retention of demonstrable previous inventions not previously assigned and perhaps demonstrable previous inventions not related to the business --except for people who are hired to be pure R&D types-- and not made using company resources is not a bad idea. But taking it any further than that is very dangerous, and ultimately bad for us in my view.
So if you are an inventor and that gives you joy, protect your ability to invent.
If you enjoy golf. Golf...and leave your cell phone at home.
If you value your family, and your job demands you unduly shortchange them, find a new job or resist the temptation to be consumed by the one you are in.
In a nutshell, look out for whatever is important to you. Your employer, boss, government certainly won't.
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
Why are corps so much better off then people?
Many reasons.
The first reason is because they can't die. Even bankrupcy doesn't necessarily mean death to the corporation, and certainly doesn't mean death to its assets.
Corporations can outwait humans. If a human has something a corporations wants, all they have to do is wait a few decades. It's like with getting themselves declared a person. The very idea is ridiculous, but by asking for it decade after decade eventually the new humans got so used to hearing the demand their entire lives that they thought it was a reasonable one to make.
Also, corporations can more easily merge their assets. If you can do good woodwork, and a friend knows how to market woodworking products, you can't merge with that friend and become one person who knows how to market the woodwork products he made. A corporation can.
And another reason is that corporations are not slowed down by a conscience, a soul or any kind of morality. A corporation is an amoral godless soulless psychopath, and because it does not care about anything but maximizing profit it can be radically effective at what it does. Individual humans within the corporation who obstruct the aim of maximizing profit because of morality or some other silly human reason get weeded out over time. The list of CEO's who have explained that they have to make evil decisions or they get fired is long. Shareholders are generally the only ones who could enforce morality, but corporations own most of the shares, and when you trace them back to humans the humans tend to not be involved with the running of the business much, and instead just want return on investment.
In essence, the way corporations operate naturally makes them more powerful than humans. The task of government is to compensate for this and give preference to humans over corporations. But government has done the reverse, which is why the world is owned and operated by corporations.
We did it to ourselves. We designed corporations so that they would rule us. Ofcourse, we can, and will, undo this. But it will require more people to become aware of the need to radically redefine what a corporation is and does.
Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad (1886)
The substance of this case (a tax dispute) is of little significance, but several resources linked above detail how this fateful case subsequently was cited as precedent for granting corporations constitutional rights.
Noble v. Union River Logging Railroad Company (1893)
A corporation first successfully claims Bill of Rights protection (5th Amendment)
"Corporate Personhood"
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
Many centuries ago employee agreements were not a problem. There was a natural feedback loop in the freedom of man to live indigenously. There were abundant natural resources which could be acquired through work and devotion.
Society has evolved long past that. There is almost no free land anywhere. There are almost no free resources. Even if there were there is no free transportation to get there from here. In today's world a person must prove their usefulness to a company in order to earn the commonly accepted form of currency which they trade for the basic necessities of life.
At the time of the industrial revolution there was little need for an employee agreement. The common shop workers weren't paid enough to have the opportunity to strike out on their own and set up a competing business. Shop managers were typically compensated fairly enough but still had little possibility of putting together the type of funding that it would take to make use of their knowledge to create a competing business. Those who were wealthy enough to be able to make use of their knowledge were also compensated well enough to keep them from having any desire to compete. In many cases this simple business approach still applies today.
Why, then, has there been an evolution of employee agreements. As industry has become more powerful politically it has grown less efficient. In some instances the business bloat was so great that an enterprising employee was able to use what they learned on the job, working within an oppressive and stagnant atmosphere, and set up a company built on a "better way". Enter the need for an employee agreement.
Still, though, there are still environments where the _goal_ is to create employees who can use what they've learned and strike out on their own. These are most commonly seen in skilled trades: the path from apprentice, to journeyman, to master craftsman. The very existence of skilled trades exemplifies that an industry can function, often fruitfully, without the need for employee agreements.
What then is the real need for an employee agreement? It is greed and preservations of social divisions. Many trolls will abuse posters with,"If you don't like it then leave and start your own business." In truth many people in society have. But what of those of us who cannot start our own business because we're not financially priveleged? For the most part we're ridiculed and dismissed. Now what of those of us who cannot start our own business because it would be a contractual violation of a former employee agreement? Certainly this hasn't stopped people from leaving a bad employer to start their own business. What the employee agreement does is ensure that anyone who does start their own business does so with the blessing of the established players in the field. It is a system of nepotism that preserves power in the hands of those who already hold it. Any real competitors would be sued out of existence by a former employer long before they could get any real business started.
Apparently Evan Brown tried to start his own business without the blessing of his employer. The real question here is: why wasn't the employer able to retain Mr. Brown? Could they not give him a raise or enough vacation to make him happy or is it that his management was composed of such intolerable selfishness that Mr. Brown did what any sane human would do?
Employee agreements are a company's way of taking away the last chip that we, as intellectual workers, have: the ability to pack up and leave if the system has become intolerable. Anyone who is a proponent of these agreements is A) naive, B) pampered, C) blind. If the court had sided with Mr. Brown it would have sent a clear message to corporations: treat your employees fairly.
+++ATHZ 99:5:80
Well after reading the court's judgement the following paragraph seems to say a lot.
So it seems he did create something related to work and not just a game or php code during his off-time.