Legal Question in Intellectual Property in California

Re: breach of trust, faith and confidence?

These guys are both correct. You will need to talk with an attorney asap to find out if you still have time. We can assist you on this.

Re: breach of trust, faith and confidence?

In addition to the copyright afforded by federal law, which requires an application before you can maintain a lawsuit on it, most states still give common-law copyright protection to authors.

This probably means you should check the laws of the state in which you first published the material to determine the extent of their common-law protection and their statute of limitations.

To assert rights under the stronger federal law, you'd have to obtain a copyright and then beat the three-year statute of limitations, which would probably be reckoned from the date of the first infringement, although it's possible that subsequent infringements could also start new three-year clocks as to that particular instance of infringement.

Whether the writings produced by others based on your work are infringing or not is a very technical area and establishing that the company's version infringes your original work would require scrutiny and probably expert testimony at trial.

Your possible case is very much worth discussing with a local IP attorney in your area.

Re: breach of trust, faith and confidence?

In all likelihood, you owned the copyright as soon as you created the work. When people say you need to have a copyright to sue, they actually mean that you have to REGISTER your copyright to sue.

There is also a 3 year statute of limitations on lawsuits based upon copyright. However, there are numerous exceptions and caveats, so do not automatically assume that your potential lawsuit is time barred!! Moreover, you may have other causes of action besides copyright that may not be time barred.

You need to assess whether you are time barred immediately because the clock might be ticking. Assuming you are not time barred, there is a way to get your copyright registered on an expedited basis.

I strongly recommend that you contact an attorney who specializes in this area of the law (i.e., intellectual property).

I would be happy to speak with you if you have additional questions.

Re: breach of trust, faith and confidence?

Probably not. You did not take any precautions to protect your ideas, such as to have the company sign a non-disclosure agreement. Ideas are protected, typically, by patent law. How the ideas are expressed in writing is protected by copyright law. Copyright protection doesn't require a formal registration with the copyright office, though this is preferred. The expression is copyrighted as soon as its committed to written form. However, a few changes to the expression makes for a new expression which, in turn, garners copyright protection in its own right. In any event, I would not pursue this unless you have a lot of money to spend on legal fees.

Re: breach of trust, faith and confidence?

Your material was copyrighted when you wrote it. But ideas aren't copyrightable. And the statute of limitations on copyright infringement is 3 years... you snooze, you lose.

Re: breach of trust, faith and confidence?

Yes.