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State Trooper Fights For His Source Code
BarneyRabble writes to tell us that a Wisconsin State Trooper is fighting to maintain control of the source code for a program he wrote that helps officers write traffic tickets electronically. Praised by the state just 18 months ago, Trooper David Meredith is now suing the head of patrol claiming that the state is trying to illegally seize the source that he had developed on his own time. From the article: "Meredith, of Oconto Falls, defied an order from his bosses to relinquish the source code - the heart of the program - in October and instead deposited it with Dane County Circuit Judge David T. Flanagan, pending a ruling on who should control it. The case centers on how the software was developed. Department of Transportation attorney Mike Kernats said the State Patrol - a division of DOT - provided Meredith with a computer to write the software and gave him time off patrol duties so he could do the work. But Meredith said in court filings that he spent hundreds of hours off duty working on it, developing it almost entirely on his own time. He noted that he never signed a software licensing agreement."
After reading the article, it seems he didn't develop the software from scratch but instead modified an already existing package. So, in other words he is calling the Wisconsin police department thieves for not letting him steal someone else's work.
My twitter
It is pretty much always the case, the gov't will own the source on this one for many reasons.
1. Body of Employee Law
Since most employer/employee law leaves no room for interpreting "spare time" vs. "work time" other than how much money you have to lawyer-up he'll lose on this one because he'll run out of money defending his position.
2. Body of State/Fed Law
I know the Feds have a policy whereby they own the source on things written for them. It would not surprise me to hear this used as the "authority" whereby the code is taken.
What's sad is the guy has committed career suicide at this point and, if he hasn't already blown a bunch of money lawyering-up for the pricipal/principal(sp?) that this is his code.
Developers please note: This kind of theft of useful code/ideas is SOP in public service. If you have a great idea, develop it on your own time and find a completely unrelated avenue to promoting it. GPL is one way to go about this.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/university.html
I work for a university, and I have explicitly talked to both the senior programmer and to our boss about developing FOSS on my own time (Do it both in person and over email -- so you have a record of the conversation).
If you write computer code and want to make sure that your company/university does not try to take it from you, you need to have that conversation. Send an email today!
coding is life
He MAY be able to recover pay (even overtime) if he can show his superiors knew or should have known about the time he spent on it. I can't see him getting anything else. He's never going to be making millions off that software.
He could always destroy the source code instead of giving it to the state... and risk being sent to jail for a computer crime.
When you read the article - it says he did "almost" all the development on this own time. As soon as that "almost" creeps in there, the state can correctly argue that they paid for part of the development. That is the opening they need to gain at least partial ownership of the program. Because of that and the state providing him training to learn how to connect to the Tracs system - me thinks this isn't a slam dunk for the officer.
In CA (as has been mentioned MANY times before on slashdot) there is a specific law stating that what is developed by an employee on the employee's own time belongs to the employee as long as there was no company resources were used. The officer wouldn't be able to claim that as described by the officer even in a state that has such specific provisions in their own state codes.
I wish him luck - but I suspect the state is going to win this one.
Have you compiled your kernel today??
I was about to Google the law in California, out of personal curiosity, as to the rules of ownership of a copyright for works produced under certain employment circumstances. I found a very good article on Ownership of Copyrights, but sorting out who is right was giving me a headache.
I suspect the officer doesn't have a legal leg to stand on--but answering that question is going to require a peek at his employment contract, the work that was done, the other compensation or tools provided: in short, it's going to require lawyers and courts and judges to sort it out. Which is, sadly, the primary reason why we have lawyers, courts and judges.
As for what you think, it's irrelevant. Case law disagrees with you.
Sounds like all you see is "Low prices! Wow! Look at all the money I'm saving!!" Except... not really. And you're also causing harm to others. Why?
Have you ever paused to think about what Wal-Mart's business practices do to American businesses (I am guessing you are in the US since they do most of their business there)? Wal-Mart does a great job of driving wages down, and doesn't pay its employees anywhere near enough and overprices health care, thus causing a lot of Wal-Mart employees to use state-funded healthcare or just walk into emergency rooms -- which also is paid for from taxpayer funds?
That is why Wal-Mart is so reviled -- as it rightfully should be. Take a moment to ask why those prices are so low and think about what your supporting those unethical business practices is doing to your fellow citizens.
i am a soviet space shuttle