RE: Do you give permission to use your materials?

Subject: RE: Do you give permission to use your materials?
From: "Harry Bacheler" <hbacheler -at- geo -dot- census -dot- gov>
To: "Megan Golding" <megan -dot- golding -at- dvtsensors -dot- com>, "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 10:38:54 -0500

To Megan:

Several questions that come up in this case are the following:

1) What is the position of the company relative to the 'documents'? (That
is, the legal position)?

2) Do you (personally) have the 'authority' to grant this permission?

What this means is that the material was developed four your company.
You 'possibly' signed an employment agreement that said that whatever
you produced on company time would be the property of the company and
not yourself. This you could/should check out.

3) Will there to be any compensation for the materials that you provide?

Remember you were paid a salary, provided workspace, (et al), which was a
company expense.

4) Should the company you work for 'release' the company's intellectual
property for no cost?

A lot of companies charge for their 'technical manuals'. And the amount is
not cheap.

5) Relative to pitfalls - you have a risk in that this other company could
make statements or
provide information that would put your company at risk 'legally'.

6) It doesn't make any difference if you are a consultant or an employee,
you don't 'give away' anything.

7) You say "... This customer needs a customized manual. I am not in a
position, at my
job, to do the customization for them. ... "

I would say that you 'are' in the position to do the job. It is an
opportunity for your company
to obtain additional business, develop relationships, and insure that
the documentation is 'correct'.

It is possible that you would be able to exploit your familiarity with the
product
to other companies that are purchasing/using your product.

Your 'department' could hire additional employees to handle the additional
business.

These are some of my thoughts.

I would suggest that you consult with your company's legal counsel 'BEFORE'
you pass on the material.

Remember there are laws relative to copyrights that protect the original
owner of the 'copyrighted' document.

To other TECHWR-L'ers:

What are your thoughts?

Harry M. Bacheler, Jr.
Consultant
VGS, Inc.

"The thoughts, ideas, and opinions expressed in my portion of this
email are mine and mine alone. They are not the thoughts, ideas,
and/or opinions of any past, present, or future employers, or any
group thatI might belong to."

> -----Original Message-----
> From: bounce-techwr-l-20951 -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
> [mailto:bounce-techwr-l-20951 -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com]On Behalf Of Megan
> Golding
> Sent: Monday, 24 January, 2000 3:04 PM
> To: TECHWR-L
> Subject: Do you give permission to use your materials?
>
> ... snip ...
> I told our customer I'd waiver the copyright for them and provide them
> source documents to take sections they need for their materials.
>
> ... snip ...

> I don't see why this customer should "reinvent the wheel" to create their
custom
> materials when I have a perfectly good base for them to build on.
>
> I should be clear: I am not a consultant (I would never give away
> my work if I was!), but rather I work for a company writing generic
manuals.

> ... snip ...

> I have asked for final review of their finished materials as a way to
ensure
> quality (and that our company name doesn't come up looking bad).
>
> ... snip ...
>
> Regards,
> Megan Golding, Applications Engineer
> DVT Corporation, mailto:megan -dot- golding -at- dvtsensors -dot- com
>
>





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