Re: Copyrights

[Jo Francis Byrd <jbyrd -at- byrdwrites -dot- com>]

In my personal opinion, the company's behavior was very unethical. They might
have owned the work, but should have included the consultant's name in the
application and given that person credit. If an employee had done the work, that
employee should have gotten the credit along with the company. I'm glad they
didn't win.

My nickel's worth

Jo Byrd

Theresa Jones wrote:

> <snip>
> >Fifth, documents written as "work-for-hire" automatically belong to whatever
> entity hired the writer, not the writer.</snip>
>
> I have a question about this rule.  How is ownership figured in the case of
> winning awards?  I ask this question because a few years ago, a former
> employer submitted a multi-media product that was completely created by a
> consultant they hired to a prestigious tech writing competition.  In the
> application they submitted, they made no mention of the consultant that did
> all the work- despite the fact that none of the employed writers had even
> heard of the software the consultant used on the interactive product.
>
> If the work of a consultant belongs entirely to the entity who hired that
> consultant, can the technical writing department of that entity win writing
> awards for that consultant's work?  Should the company acknowledge that a
> consultant wrote it, or should they even submit the work at all?  How are
> awards committees supposed to know if a work was created by a consultant or by
> an employee of a company?
>
> The company did not win, by the way, they got a 'runner-up' type award. Thanks
> for your thoughts!