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Comment by tinco | Hacker News Reader

Would you ask for the copyright back? As in, it doesn't seem like they're helping you at all, so maybe you could tell them you're leaving and you would like to have the copyright back.

It might force them to show their colors, and if anything turn the brouhaha into something more clear cut.

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My case is a little special because I developed the WiX Toolset when I was an employee at Microsoft. I never owned the copyright (Microsoft did). So, I wouldn't be asking for the copyright back... I'd be asking for it for the first time.

And there are advantages to a legally well protected entity holding the copyright. One for example: my company (FireGiant) is "firewalled" from certain legal issues.

So I'm still contemplating the future and don't have a real answer for you yet.

But you wrote a lot of code for the project since you left Microsoft, I would think? That code should be yours.

Sure but I'm most interested in the project as a whole. And:

> And there are advantages to a legally well protected entity holding the copyright.

Interesting. From that description, it kind of sounds like you're both wanting your cake, and to eat it too?

Not sure what I'd do in your situation though. It sounds like you've put a shed load of time into improving "their" product, and don't really have much recourse if they don't want to play nice. :/

Though if you do fork it, it sounds like most of the non-MS employees would switch across to your fork?

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