Who Owns Software Source Code

**sscc** · 10-05-2007, 08:57 PM

I represent a high school in Iowa.

A few years ago we had some college students, doing a senior design project at a local university, develop a program for us (unpaid). We had the idea and the requirements, they wrote the program. They delivered a "product" that mostly worked, it did not have all the features requested and it had some bugs in it.

We had a volunteer parent add the remaining features, plus a few more, changed the look and feel (user interface), and fix the bugs. Roughly 10% of the original programming code is still the same as it was from the students.

The parent volunteer would like to market this product and make a few bucks. We're fine with that but one of the students is screaming that he owns the IP.

So my question is, who owns this software? The students, the university they attended, the high school they did the work for, or the parent volunteer that wrote/rewrote 90% of this program (with the blessing of the high school)?

Thanks,
S

**aaron** · 10-07-2007, 04:35 AM

Did you have written contracts with any of the involved people or schools?

**sscc** · 10-07-2007, 08:55 AM

Nothing in writing.

**Mr. Knowitall** · 10-07-2007, 09:36 AM

Most likely, everybody involved retained their intellectual property rights to any work that they did.

I would suggest that before trying to sell the code the parent volunteer replace any code authorized by the students, such that the application in no way relies on any work that students did.

**sscc** · 10-07-2007, 09:41 AM

Today we have allowed 4 other schools to use the software free of charge. If we started charging these schools for the use of the school's server would that be reasonable and yet not infringing on any IP issues. This is not the get-rich model but rather a way to get reimbursed for actual costs.

I appreciate your responses.