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State Trooper Fights For His Source Code
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Jan 15, 2007 12:35 PM
from the man-getting-the-man-down dept.
from the man-getting-the-man-down dept.
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."
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Resources (Score:5, Interesting)
Would that affect the case?
Re:Resources (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Interesting)
My understanding is that there were some legal challenges to that, but the main thing was that they essentially killed the golden goose. Lotus was (and still is, in it's present incarnation as "Notes" under IBM) a great system, with amazing flexibility. A lot of people swear by it, using it to run just about everything in their business. But that sort aggressive licensing took a lot of wind out of L123's sales--pun intended--and other companies were ready to fill the void, turning it into an also-ran.
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Funny)
Let me fix that for you.
A lot of people swear at it
There, thats better
Parent
Re:Resources (Score:5, Funny)
Your sig: My info page is filling up with rejected posts. How can I purge these?
The real problem is that you obviously don't know how submit stories the "slashdot way." Here are some basic tips for submitting stories:
1. Never submit an original or timely story.
Instead please submit week-old stories from CNet News [com.com].
2. When submitting a story, please try to misspell words or make critical grammatical errors.
While in normal circumstances this would be unacceptable, it is considered l33t on Slashdot.
3. Always pander to the liberal, anti-MS, or anti-digital rights sycophants on Slashdot with an absurd political statement in the guise of a question.
Example: "Given the fact that the format issues with high-definition optical disks have yet to be worked out, how can we foil further assaults on our Constitutional rights by George Bush?
4. Submit stories that are as polarizing as possible.
Example title: Totally Unknown and Unqualified Blogger Says Linux is Better Than Mac.
Example Text: 13-year-old student, Little Billy Ballinger, has issued his annual assessment of Operating Systems and Linux has come out on top. FTA: "As a guy who has only used my mom's spyware-laden Windows 98 machine, I find myself in a unique position to declare a winner in the OS wars--and I choose Linux."
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MOD PARENT UP (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:MOD PARENT UP (Score:5, Funny)
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a GNU.
someone else has seen into the heart of slashdot
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Re:MOD PARENT UP (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Resources (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Insightful)
In addition, even if he got permission from his supervisors to develop whatever, whenever and he would have right to it, doesn't mean this is the case. It is unlikely that his supervisors have authorization to give this permission and/or to make capital purchases. Those decisions would have been made at a higher level.
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Re:Resources (Score:5, Informative)
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.
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Federal Law (Score:5, Interesting)
The officer is wrong on one point: this is a matter for Federal law. (The very same issue is why Novell was able to move SCO vs. Novell from Utah court to Federal Court.)
Federal law controls on copyight matters, overiding both state law and whatever contract he was (forced to) sign. And Federal law says that the program is his, and not the State of Wisconsin's, unless either (a) it was produced during the normal course of his working day; or (b) it was specifically commissioned in writing; or else (c) there is a signed written specific instrument of conveyance (US Code Title 17, Chapter 1 Section 101 and Chapter 2 Section 204).
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Head Asplode... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Head Asplode... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Head Asplode... (Score:5, Insightful)
You never hear any of them suggesting the government do a study or a trial to see if our speed limits could safely be higher.
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Re:Head Asplode... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:The purpose of the law.... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Hmm... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hmm... (Score:4, Funny)
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the suspence is killing me (Score:3, Funny)
The minute they... (Score:5, Interesting)
My boss is very liberal about what we do in the IT department as long as things are running smoothly and we get long term projects done on time. But even here I am careful to keep anything I might potentially think of as mine at home and off company equipment.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
However, if his employment contract does contain a work for hire clause, then he screwed h
*Aways* document it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Give it to the government! (Score:3, Funny)
Tracs (Score:4, Insightful)
FYI... (Score:5, Interesting)
2) Accepting a work computer and other considerations has *got* to seriously jeopardize his claim. For heaven's sake, do *not* accept anything like that for work which you want to own, unless you get explicit acknowledgment that your employer sees it the same way.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Assuming this is true - please site reference - you pretty much invalidate it because you don't know this about Wisconsin.
It is standard practice in the IT industry to sign an agreement that any work you create as part of your employment is the property of
Licensing (Score:4, Insightful)
The article says:
However, it goes on to state:
If he did indeed base his work off another piece of software (that was given to him on the condition that he not sell it commercially), then I don't think he really has a leg to stand on.
I'm amazed they're using his software (Score:5, Insightful)
The police force should have never accepted the program without accompanying source code, or (worst case) some sort of license.
-B
The code belongs to his employer. (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact, in most cases if the work is any any way related to his work domain it's theirs even if they _didn't_ provide any resources, or at least they have a strong case to argue this.
He's wasting his time and the court's time, he can't win.
Standard Operating Procedure (Score:3, Informative)
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.
Not as bad as it 1st sounds, still messy though (Score:4, Interesting)
In 2003, the state sent Meredith to Iowa to get trained on the Iowa Department of Transportation's Traffic and Criminal Software, or TraCS. Iowa gave Wisconsin the software for free on the condition that Wisconsin not develop the application for commercial purposes, said Kernats.
At the request of his superiors, Meredith tweaked the program so that it would work in Wisconsin and created a way to import driver information and criminal histories into it. The software that imports data saves time and prevents errors, said Jones, the union president
Dang, on the one hand he's praised for going beyond call of duty (great game too) and on the other he was assigned to the project by his bosses.
This Trooper isn't a programmer first, he's a cop, who does cop things like write speeding tickets (over 2k a year FTA).
He screwed up by doing what his bosses asked him to do without having paper in place to cover what would happen to his work.
They screwed up by asking a non-programmer (I sure he is a code wizard but he was hired to be cop first) to do something beyond their job description using personal skills and ultimately personal time.
Interesting enough, if I read it right, if the State gets control of the modified software, they won't be selling it for commercial gain, whereas it seems Mr Meredith is interested in making money off of his work, fair, but Iowa originally provided the software with a clause preventing that.
Grasping? (Score:4, Interesting)
The fact that he did it off the clock hardly seems like his boss' fault.
If I had to pick based on that info, well, he'd need to turn over his code. Regardless you can be sure that neither party will make these mistakes again.
Always clear this with your boss... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/university.html [gnu.org]
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!
This is a union job. Different rules. (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a unionized job. So there's a union contract [wseu-24.org] in effect.
There's no intellectual property clause in that union contract. But there's an overtime clause, which provides for time and a half for overtime and includes the line "Implementation of alternative work patterns or any variation thereof shall be by mutual agreement between the Employer and the Union." That says "Employer and the Union", not "Employer and the Employee", as is standard in labor contracts. Any special deals on hours have to be done through the union. This prevents the employer from pressuring employees individually. Any special arrangements about working at home have to be cleared with the union, and, of course, that's paid time.
"Work for Hire" is a very explicit thing in a union job. The company does not own your life outside work.
Unions - the people who brought you the weekend.
Re:the take-away point (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:the take-away point (Score:5, Insightful)
* Write a little bit
* Go to your boss and say "I'll write the rest if you allow it to be Free Software"
* Get that in writing
* Be prepared to say "good luck getting someone else to finish the project" as you walk away
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Re:the take-away point (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, try it like this: (The American Way)
God bless MLK, I got the day off.
I work as a contractor for the DOD. A few years ago, a government employee did that. He was the boss of the shop, developed a cool DB system. Quit. Opened his shop, sold his system. Profit.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:He didn't sign any agreement... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:He didn't sign any agreement... (Score:4, Interesting)
Nor is it that simple either. A key word here is "scope." One important test is whether or not the employer is in business to create such works. So, a programmer employed by a software house and writing software is probably creating a work for hire. But the police are not in the business of creating software. So, even when provided resources and paid time to do the work, it does not necessarily follow that the result is a work for hire.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not having a signed agreement does not make the code his. He was given time from work to write it and used his employer's computer. Therefore the code might be theirs.
Well... not all of it. (Score:5, Insightful)
A fair solution would be the officer gives the rights to his employer, and his employer gives him a nice bonus for overtime work ($10,000-$20,000, depending on the amount of time he spent and the quality of the changes he made). If I were him I'd try to settle out of court.
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Re:He didn't sign any agreement... (Score:5, Informative)
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.
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Re:and all I can think of is... (Score:4, Funny)
In this case, it's "What cha gonna do when they code for you?"
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