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Comment by pmjordan | Hacker News Reader

That sort of stuff is illegal/unenforcible in many countries. It's not clear where you're located, but it's probably worth checking.

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In the U.S., many jobs that do not have set hours have clauses like this. For instance, many university jobs, especially in research, stipulate that you are not allowed to have any other jobs. The reason for this is that because a research position is self-directed, you could conceivably have another full-time job and just run away with the money.

I don't think that's true at all, if anything they claim rights to all your ip -- and thus have a process to relinquish it. steve wozniak goes to hp and say i invented this computer do you want it, or can I start a company with it. In general it's better to have them sign away their rights to your ip before you start working on it.

The difference being that Woz actually wanted HP to take the computer and make it. He helped start Apple when that fell through.

I was under the impression Woz didn't realise until after the Apple I was developed that HP might have the rights to it.

From iWoz:

<quote>

Before the partnership agreement was even inked, I realized something and told Steve. Because I worked at HP, I told him, everything I'd designed during the term of my employment contract belonged to HP.

Whether that upset Steve or not, I couldn't tell. But it didn't matter to me if he was upset about it. I believed it was my duty to tell HP about what I had designed while working for them.

[Later, after getting an order for one hundred Apple Is]

I decided I should run the whole thing by HP one more time. I spoke to Pete again. He told me to run it by legal. The legal department ran it by every single division of HP. That process took about two weeks. But HP still wasn't interested, and I received a note from HP's legal department saying they claimed no right to my design.

</quote>

Oh Merciful Book Industry, please do not smite me for reproducing a few paragraphs from a book.

I seem to recall him saying that he had intended on giving it to HP in the first place in his interview in Founders at Work. I don't have access to it, and I'm going off of memory, so you're probably right. :-)

I stand corrected. Founders at Work, p. 41:

<quote> The very first thought in my mind was, "I think I signed a document that everything I design belongs to Hewlett-Packard." Even just on my own time, I thought that they deserved it first. And I wanted Hewlett-Packard to build this. </quote>

Good call.

Well, my co-founder is an academic, and his contract says that he is allowed to work 20% of his time as a "consultant" but 80% has to be for the university. IP was not an issue.

I'm actually in the Netherlands. I will ask for legal advice to be sure.

I'm in the Netherlands too. I also have a (Dutch) law degree. That does not make me an authority, yet if your product and theirs are not in the same industry or in another way in competition, I can't think of any legal grounds on which this clause can be enforced, but several of why it can't be. That said there is a real chance that pressing the issue is going to make the relationship turn sour. Remember that in your first month you can be fired without cause, without compensation. You likely also have an employment contract of limited duration (1 year?) which they don't have to prolong.

An alternative is to not give up your company and hope they fire you, and then sue for unfounded dismissal. This can be quite lucrative. I wouldn't want to wage a legal battle in a country I just arrived in, in a language I don't speak though.

If you speak Dutch there is a quite good forum that often has useful advise (in addition to consulting a lawyer, not instead of).

The union advise below is, as much as I dislike them, good - for little money they will help you out with this. A legal assistance insurance isn't going to cover this issue at this point, if you didn't have one before this whole thing started.

Also I'm really curious on what company this is, and what country you're from.

From previous postings I believe the OP is Italian.

You are right, my main concern now is not to turn things bad, since I just moved here a couple of weeks ago and I live in an apartment I rent from them. You also guessed correctly, I have a 6 month contract.

I don't speak Dutch yet, unfortunately, and even if I'm studying it, it will not become good enough in a short time. So I can't use the forum you wrote about.

Answering your last question: I'm Italian and I'm working for a big big social network here (you will surely know it). The workplace is quite good actually, except for this rule, that happens to be one of the most important things to me...

Yes then I know who you're talking about. I also found out from previous postings where you're from.

I was intrigued by the legal issues and after doing some research I am not so convinced any more as I was in my previous answer. You didn't provide the full text of your non-compete clause but most 'standard' ones are quite elaborate and do include broad exclusions on what is considered being in competition. Considering that your company can afford professional council I would expect your employment contract to be quite elaborate and tight. The case law also points to a fairly broad interpretation of non-compete clauses - i.e. the competition can be only slightly overlapping and that would still be covered by many non-compete clauses.

On top of that, now that I know who your employer is, I would argue that you are (with at least one of your products) in direct competition with them and/or several of their strategic partners. It still sucks for you that they promised you could continue work on it and now they won't let you but that does not have any legal standing any more.

Anyway good luck. One hint as to an option would be that your Ltd can have a trust for a director, and that the beneficiaries of UK trusts can be anonymous...

most probably Netlog, i deleted my account months ago

    I'm Italian

That's a big advantage, as as an EU citizen you will not be deported if you lose your job (and don't find another one shortly thereafter).

Hmm, I'm Dutch (that is: from the Netherlands :)), and I strongly doubt the law here can forbid you to do side projects in your own time, as long as they don't compete. There have been some cases (mostly extreme stuff: like can police agents do drugs in their free time), but in general I'd say it would be hard to forbid here. OTOH, IANAL. Keep us posted!

Hmm, all the work you would do in your 'own time' would be owned (copyright-wise) by your employer then anyway, unless you'd explicitly excluded that in your contract. This is tricky part of the (Dutch) law, where the all work you do owned by your employer if it's the same kind of work you're employed to do. More info (in Dutch): http://www.iusmentis.com/auteursrecht/nl/vvv/maker/#werkgeve...

Actually, that link says it only applies for work done on company time, not outside of it.

No, this is not true. The link you post itself indicates otherwise. It is also in contrast with the Auteurswet.

What is true is that an employer becomes copyright holder of any work done for that employer, as part of the employment contract. No further contractual agreement is necessary.

I stand corrected. There are some edge cases though. Here's a case (from the same site) what can happen (again, in Dutch): http://blog.iusmentis.com/2008/03/08/in-eigen-tijd-gemaakte-...

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