[dragonwriter]

> That was the intent, but not what actually happened.

The intent is a fact of what actually happened: which appears to be that it was written by an employee within the scope of employment to solve a business problem. Possibly outside of usual working hours, but if it’s by a salaried employee where doing work at home outside of usual working hours is itself a normal if not consistent part of employment, is probably not particularly significant.

That the employer later chose not to make use of it doesn’t change the circumstances of its creation; businesses often choose to not pursue use of exploratory work done by employees in the course of employment, that doesn’t surrender ownership of the work product.

And the version that was further developed within and in response to Uber business needs and actively used at Uber before the function for which it was used was terminated is an even clearer case (insofar as it is a distinct work from the original) of work-product (that it quite likely is also an unlicensed derivative work by Uber of proprietary Box code doesn’t mitigate that, though it puts Uber in the position of potentially being both a beneficiary and victim of IP violations.)

[Dylan16807]

> which appears to be that it was written by an employee within the scope of employment to solve a business problem.

An imagined business problem.

If the code wasn't relevant to their actual business practices, that's quite relevant. They not only didn't want that code, they didn't want anything like it.

As for the modifications for Uber, that's not what I'm here to contest.

[adastra22]

No, it’s not relevant. Seriously, go consult a lawyer in this. I have. They’re very consistent on this point because there are tons of case law regarding it.

There are a massive number of examples of patent and copyright litigation stemming from work done for one employer, who rejected it, then the employee goes off and founds their own company and gets successfully sued.

Fairchild was unique in that they had claim to the IP that their employees wanted to use in new startups, yet they decided not to follow through and allowed the employees to start their own companies. They could’ve prosecuted but didn’t, and as a result we got Silicon Valley and the culture that surrounds it.

But it’s no guarantee that that your employer won’t pursue a copyright claim they are perfectly within their rights to do. Don’t assume your employer is Fairchild.