Comment on I wrote a program for my boss. How legal is to to write the program again and make it FOSS?
lemmyvore@feddit.nl 10 months agoIf you rewrite it in a clean-room approach and another language it will most likely not be in breach of copyright.
But there are many other aspects where you may be at fault: breaking confidentiality, using trade secrets, non-disclosure, non-compete etc.
My advice would be to have an honest discussion with the company owner and ask for the permission to open the code under a permissive license. Be prepared to explain what the advantages would be for the company, beyond “the code is just sitting there”. Be prepared to drop it if they say no.
If you go ahead it is quite possible you will be sued. Make sure you’re willing to risk it and spend time and money defending your project.
alonely0@programming.dev 10 months ago
–Not legal advice-- Except he can’t do clean-room development because copyright is viral. If he had access to the copyrighted source, any code he writes on the matter, if it coincides with the copyrighted one to some extent, can be pursued for copyright claims (IBM v. Microsoft). For example, when there’s a leak of Windows source, ReactOS devs get super scared, because it really puts them on the line. Another example is Nouveau, which can’t accept anyone who has worked at NVIDIA. That being said, the company was not intending to do anything with it, so they can’t claim damages; ergo, he’s completely safe.
DroneRights@lemm.ee 10 months ago
I’m not a he
alonely0@programming.dev 10 months ago
Fixed.