Legal Question in Intellectual Property in New York

Re: Who owns website code

It depends on the agreement between the developer and the person contracting with them. If the agreement states that all work done by the developer is "works for hire," then the contracting party owns it and the developer does not.

However, developers oftentimes retain the rights to certain scripts, templates, modules or other "pre-existing" works and merely provide a license of some sort for those aspects with the contracting party retaining the rights to the "customized" work. Other times, the developer may require you to license the customized work back to him/her so s/he can use it for other clients.

Without knowing exactly the relationship between the developer and the contracting party, whether and to what extent there was an agreement and what aspect of the IP is in question, it is difficult to give a definitive answer.

You can visit my website: www.computorney.com and contact me for more information. The initial consulatation is free with no obligation to use our services. However, if we determine that you have rights you can enforce or there is a claim against which you need to defend yourself and you are interested in using our services, we can certainly help you come up with a strategy.

Thanks,

Michael