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."

Comments

You Know...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd tell you what I think, but you're gonna have to ask my employer first.

Help protest this ruling...

[Radon Knight]

...by refusing to think at work!

Re:Help protest this ruling...

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Because of a contract that I had to sign in order to get my current job (such are required for just about any technical job), I have put off any further development of my prior ideas, and leave all new ones dormant except for those that are actually within the function of my job, and trivial hobby stuff.

You give up too much without a fight. My contract has a clause in it specifically stating that the company has no claim on anything I do that doesn't use any company time or company resources. I made them show me the full text of the contract they were going to ask me to sign on day one, not just the quick summary they sent when they offered the job, precisely to check that such a clause was there, and to request one otherwise.

In fact, I gather than in quite a few jurisdictions, such contractual terms are likely to be unenforceable anyway. And even if not, don't sell yourself short; look at the contract before signing up for a job, question the absence of such a clause (or why there's a "we own everything" clause) by presenting something that's clearly your own work and asking whether the employer feels they have a right to it, and embarrass them into changing the contract.

Morally they don't have a leg to stand on, and as long as you politely but firmly require them to acknowledge this before you start working for them, they won't have one legally either. No sane employer is going to go all the way through a recruitment process, pick someone they like, offer them the job, and then retract the offer in the face of a clearly reasonable request regarding the contractual terms. If a potential employer of yours does, just walk away; you now know exactly what kind of attitude they have towards their staff, and you can certainly do better elsewhere.

Say it isn't so

[Donoho]

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?

Re:Say it isn't so

[matdavis]

This section I read from the judgment sounds to me as if his idea was exactly what he was supposed to be working on (thanks to Google's cache, and the bold is mine):

B. The Status of the Solution

Brown repeatedly claims there is a fact issue that the Solution was not an invention, or even a conception falling under the terms of the employment agreement. However, he claimed in his April 1996 memo to management, I have developed a method of converting machine executable binary code into high level source code form using logic and data abstractions. . . . Brown has not presented any other credible evidence to contradict this assertion.

Brown also claims Alcatel was not in the business of designing software, but was in the telecommunications business. Thus, the employment agreement is not applicable to the Solution. However, the evidence in the record establishes that Brown managed the group at Alcatel charged with maintaining and developing automated conversion tools for converting high-level code to low- level code. The record further shows that one of Brown's job functions was to manually convert Alcatel's existing low-level code to high-level code. The evidence shows Alcatel twice investigated automated conversion tools in 1993 and 1995. In addition, in 1993, Brown managed the employee charged with investigating the low-level to high-level automated code conversion process and received a status report on his research on October 18, 1993.

We do not believe the court below erred in concluding Alcatel, pursuant to the employment agreement, owns full legal right, title and interest to the process and/or method that is known as the Solution. We overrule Brown's first issue in its entirety.

Re:Sadly, yes...

[1shooter]

In some ways, corporate America really treats employees like slave.

Maybe you should tell your boss how you are enslaved working there and perhaps you will be freed.

Re:Sadly, yes...

[sploxx]

I wonder if all these documents and provisions of the companies are overall economically efficient....

For the particular company, it's a plus to extort it's employees in such a way. But now, with such a known case of lawful "mind-owning", maybe some people will be more careful about what ideas they'll give to their employer... thus hampering the free flow of ideas which mainly drives the economy.

The same happens IMHO with quick hiring and firing of people. Noone thinks that it is wortwhile to work more than is neccessary for not getting fired. And noone gives more of his/her ideas than what is neccessary to keep the job.

Maybe someone with knowledge of both economy and social sciences can defeat or confirm this argument?

Be careful what you sign!

[jfmerryman]

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)

Re:Sadly, yes...

[Otter]

With all /. articles, but particularly in the YRO section, it's worth reading beyond the always skewed, frequently wrong summaries.

According to the court's ruling, the guy was hired in 1987 and signed a perfectly ordinary waiver requiring that he disclose any inventions relevant to the subject of his work. He disclosed this reverse compiler idea in 1996. In my experience, when you sign those IP waivers you have the opportunity to decalre any existing work and it's extremely worth your while to give your brain a good wracking to make sure you get anything worthwhile on that paper.

Google's employees

[usefool]

Google encourages employees to use 1 day per week on their own hobby/project, does that mean...?

There is a certain irony in this...

[wintermute42]

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...

Re:Sadly, yes...

[peacefinder]

So quit.

No, seriously, leave. Get out. If you feel like you are being treated like a slave, get out while you can. We are citizens, not serfs, and we don't have to put up with that crap. Your dignity is worth a great deal of money. Find a way to leave.

For the rest of you, read the pre-employment contracts that your prospective employers ask you to sign. If you don't like something in it, cross it out and initial it, then point out the struck section for the hiring manager to initial as well before you sign. If they initial it, keep a copy forever. If they refuse to initial it, refuse to sign the contract. Sure, that may mean you don't get the job... is that really so bad?

(IANAL, of course, so my method may be insufficient. If you're really worried about it, then by all means seek proper legal advice.)

Re:Sadly, yes...

[peacefinder]

Obviously, sometimes it is that bad. I strongly suspected I'd get at least one reply like yours. I really do empathize with your plight.

But not everyone is in that position. Some people are in a much stronger position to negotiate, and accept unreasonable terms of employment simply because they are careless. This hurts us all.

This trend you note came to be when unscrupulous managers discovered that employees just signed whatever was put in front of them. Why not ask to own them? We have only two ways to stop it: legislate against it, or incite all of us to stop meekly complying with employers' unfair demands.

I can't legislate, but I sure can try to incite disobedience. ;-)

It all boils down to this:

[EmagGeek]

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.

Cross it out

[baughdw]

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.

Re:BIG BROTHER ALCATEL

[Catbeller]

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.

Re:Read this if you've ever had a thought of your

[Analogy Man]

I think it is a matter of insulating the business world from your soul...a corporate entity in itself has no soul/emotion/angst/id whatever. If there is money to be had the dispassionate corporation will do so regardless of right or wrong, but within the law (hopefully).

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.