Comment by jensneuse | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jensneuse | Hacker News Reader

I've built WunderGraph (https://wundergraph.com) as a side project until it was ready for real "startup mode". I've asked my employer to give me an IP exclusion for the project in writing. Then I dedicated 1-2 hours in the morning and maybe at night as well on the weekend, depending on my energy level.

I've developed the product until it had a certain maturity. I've then onboarded two co-founders who also helped part-time. One helped with marketing, one with develoent. I've found them through YC cofounder match and the dev from GitHub OSS projects. Together, we've landed our first paying customer. With a few more leads in the pipeline, we were able to start the fundraising process.

We then slowly transitioned from side project to full time. The complete team is now full time for 2 months and we're very happy how things are going.

I can say that it was a damn struggle to get all this up and running with 2 young kids and without ruining the family. I'm thankful that my wife is very supportive. It's weird when your partner accepts that you work 3 hours per day on the weekend while the kids sleep. But there was no other way. It needed to be done. Of you really believe in what you do, it's possible, even with a family. If you have questions, please ask.

I've managed to get specific exclusions for IP I've worked on as a side project, and more recently got my employer to include the majority of the github "balanced employee ip agreement" [1] in our employment contracts, which states quite clearly "If you create IP outside the scope of your employment or contract or before or after your employment or contract ("Your IP"), the Company doesn't own it" [2] (UK based company)

[1] https://github.blog/2017-03-21-work-life-balance-in-employee... [2] https://github.com/github/balanced-employee-ip-agreement/blo...

Sounds good! One thing I'd like to add is that some people might be afraid to ask for an IP exclusion. Think about it from an employer perspective. Should they let you go just because you have a side project you'd like to work on? Probably not. If you'd like to sell it, your side project will teach you need skills.

> Should they let you go just because you have a side project you'd like to work on? Probably not.

I'm thinking out loud from an employer's perspective: Will this employee leave for his side project, if we not let him work on it? Probably not. Will they leave if this side project succeeds? Probably yes. Will they be less interested and more distracted in our job? Probably yes. So, why risk it.

Very good food for thought. Developers usually never succeed with side projects. They have no clue how to create a business. They love to code. They love to tinker. Let them tinker around. Will they be distracted? Yes! But who cares if your employees browse Hackernews and reddit or build side projects?

Will they leave if it succeeds? Maybe. If it's the case for one of my employees, I will help them, be their Angel, invest into them and help them with my network. I started with a side project myself. It was so hard. We need more smart entrepreneurs and I want to support them.

Will they be less interested? It's possible. At the same time, it's the employers job to offer interesting work.

That said, I don't disagree with you. It always depends. But don't worry so much about the success of side projects. Less than 1% of your employees can turn a side project into something successful.

This is very much how I would reason about the case. My take on how an employer would approach the problem was cynical on purpose, because that's how “business professionals” think. Unfortunately, the corporate world is riddled with such “professionals” who have no clue about how knowledge work works. And, again unfortunately, laws favor corporations in expense of individual liberty.

> “If you create IP outside the scope of your employment or contract or before or after your employment or contract ("Your IP"), the Company doesn't own it”

Forgive my ignorance, but is this statement required in any of the jurisdictions in the world? In a post-slavery world, an employer cannot own what I choose to do with my own resources outside the scope of my employment.

Prior to this the contract let the employer claim rights over all IP I created unless specifically exempted.

From this: https://www.russell-cooke.co.uk/insight/briefings/2020/intel...

"The general position under English law is that IP rights created by an employee within the course of employment automatically belong to the employer; where there is any doubt as to whether an employee or their employer owns IP rights, the relevant legislation largely favours employers."

"If material which includes IP rights is created outside office hours and/or using the employee’s private resources this may give rise to arguments that the rights belong to the employee rather than their employer, but that is not decisive. The fact that work is done outside normal working hours does not necessarily mean that the work is not done in the course of employment as, for many employees, there is often no clear demarcation of the hours of work."

"The key question to be asked is whether the work was the kind of work which the employee was employed to do i.e. whether it was within the scope of their employment. Could the employee have been ordered to do the work and would it have been a breach of contract for the employee to not do it? The terms of any contract of employment and job description will be relevant, however, these (and duties more generally) often evolve in the course of time and it may therefore not be appropriate to rely on them exclusively."

IANAL, but my reading of that is that if I wrote a novel about unicorns and rainbows, that wouldn't be owned by the company, but if I wrote software, it would.

> Prior to this the contract let the employer claim rights over all IP I created unless specifically exempted.

Makes more sense now. Even in that case, I have many questions regarding the quoted parts in the article. Especially regarding the “demarcation of hours of work”, why would the burden of proof be on the employee? Employer is supposed to keep track of hours of work. If they cannot prove that employee developed the IP during company time, then it shouldn't belong to the company. But then, law and justice are very different things.

> if I wrote a novel about unicorns and rainbows, that wouldn't be owned by the company, but if I wrote software, it would.

I would say that software is too general to be applicable, and yet there's this anecdote somewhere else on this thread [0].

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/context?id=32885772

It is pretty common in most US states to own ip developed outside work hours. The concept is pretty simple: by default, your employer is paying you for the ideas you generate, and this could happen at home.

Imagine you work in cold fusion research and you spend your days performing tests and reading papers. If you have a dream and wake up with a solution, this is part of what your employer has been paying you for, and the time of day is irrelevant.

In case I couldn't make it clear so far, I defend that either of the following conditions should hold for employer to claim rights: (a) IP is developed using company resources (time, equipment, etc.) or (b) IP is within the scope of company's business.

> your employer is paying you for the ideas you generate, and this could happen at home.

If employer's idea is about company's business, then yes, I would say that the company owns the rights. If not, employer owns the rights.

I'm not sure if ideas count as IP though. If I had an idea at work about a business that is outside the scope of my company's, to whom the rights belong?

Then you have to negotiate that.

looks like a great project! Found a typo: "Less then 1 minute"

Thank you

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