Hey all,
I have a situation... My wife paid another performing artist to create a website for her, which in their arrangements included hosting.
For my understanding this is a work for hire, since he would not have made this website otherwise, without her payment.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_for_hire
Now that the registry of her URL is coming up, he does not want to send us the files for the site so we can reload it onto the hosting plan that I have for my websites. He claims it is not their policy to release files. We like the base design, while the mystery meat navigation is slow and buggy, the base of the design is nice. We offered to keep his design credits unless a complete overhaul occurs, since we like the visual layout. For my knowledge, my wife paid for:
1. graphic design of the site
2. hosting from web release until this summer, seperately from basic design cost
3. registry of her URL, which was put in her name under his business.
What to do?
Do we keep the base design and re-script the back-end if he chooses to not send the files of the complete site?
What exactly are you buying when you contract for a site to be built, if not the files that comprise the site?
Recommendations?
Many thanks,
MT
I have a situation... My wife paid another performing artist to create a website for her, which in their arrangements included hosting.
For my understanding this is a work for hire, since he would not have made this website otherwise, without her payment.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_for_hire
Now that the registry of her URL is coming up, he does not want to send us the files for the site so we can reload it onto the hosting plan that I have for my websites. He claims it is not their policy to release files. We like the base design, while the mystery meat navigation is slow and buggy, the base of the design is nice. We offered to keep his design credits unless a complete overhaul occurs, since we like the visual layout. For my knowledge, my wife paid for:
1. graphic design of the site
2. hosting from web release until this summer, seperately from basic design cost
3. registry of her URL, which was put in her name under his business.
What to do?
Do we keep the base design and re-script the back-end if he chooses to not send the files of the complete site?
What exactly are you buying when you contract for a site to be built, if not the files that comprise the site?
Recommendations?
Many thanks,
MT
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SF Bay Area
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Re: Who owns the files on my website?
Tue, April 22, 2008 - 8:14 PMYou may have to get a attorney on the matter. If the files are paid for and contracted as well( on paper ), and they contain your wife's art it's your property. You may only have to get a attorney friend to put the fear of God into the person to make them come correct. To my knowledge once you buy something you own it, not the person you bought it from. I've had problems with photographers in the past w/ a similar situation. They tried to say they owned photos I paid for. -
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Re: Who owns the files on my website?
Wed, April 23, 2008 - 8:55 AMPhotographers do own the copyright to photos they have taken, sold or not. If you as a client do not wish to have the work re-printed it should be clearly stated in the sales contract. I work in the aerial photo business so we come across this every day. If the photography was taken for a particular client for a particular project we will always contact the original client for permission to sell reprints even though we own the copyright. We feel it is the ethical way to handle the situation.
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Re: Who owns the files on my website?
Thu, April 24, 2008 - 12:45 PMUnfortunately, this is the kind of situation that's "too important to ignore" and yet "too small to worry about" ... Unless the website is really attracting a lot of attention, it's unlikely that there's enough at stake financially to make it worth hiring a lawyer and starting a real fight ...
I'd guess that the One Thing of Real Value is the URL -- maybe the bad guy would release that to you in exchange for you surrendering any claim to the design, etc, and your promise to only say nice things about the guy from now on ... If that happens, you can rebuild the site for relatively small amount of $, knowing that having control over the URL means you'll pretty much be in charge of the site from now on.
If the guy isn't particularly anxious to make that deal, you could certainly mention that you're going to tell everyone you know that he's a jerk ... presuming you travel in the same community, the threat of being bad-mouthed might have some traction. There are ways to raise the issue of URL ownership with the ISP that hosts the site ....
Good luck -- sounds like fun ...
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Re: Who owns the files on my website?
Sun, April 27, 2008 - 9:14 PMSounds like work for hire, to me. The originator of the work has the rights to use it for self-promotion/portfolio, but it is otherwise your property, unless otherwise stated in a contract that you were only purchasing services and the originator owns the work. Up to you if it's worth pursuing or not, under $5,000 is a small claims matter, I think you can get free legal advise from small claims court.
