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Yuki · 07-07-2004, 11:56 PM

I ran into this issue once.

A coder decided to leave after I told him to stop sexually harassing the players and to stop being an #######. He left and demanded that I remove all four of his areas he had written, along with all code he had written.

Since the code consisted of renaming the disarm skill to "disarm shield" and changing the dirt kick skill to "caltraps", I removed them. The areas I removed happily since they were overpowered, except for one area which I had rewritten of his - making it partially mine.

Now, if things had been different, I think some people present good arguments here. Dulan's idea that you should be paid because it is considered a job is bunk. Many people consider it a job from their end for all the effort they put into it.

I do not believe you should be able to up and wish to have all of your integrated code just right out removed. I don't know the law inside and out, but it would seem to me that the coder is doing "volunteer work" and any property he creates, the mud owner has rights to use. Not distribute, just use.

So they want it ripped out... well, you should have thought of that beforehand. Mind you, this is all for free, nonprofit muds I assume, since they are not companies I wager. A profit making mud had better have some contract made up for you.

Ask for a copy of your work, or even a copy of the codebase, ask to not have your code just given away for fun, and go about your business.

You'll probably realize in six months what utter crap you had written anyways, along with how you could code something 10x cooler more efficiently.

07-07-2004, 11:56 PM	#12
Yuki Member Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: My laptop, my apt, Columbus, Ohio, USA Posts: 42	I ran into this issue once. A coder decided to leave after I told him to stop sexually harassing the players and to stop being an #######. He left and demanded that I remove all four of his areas he had written, along with all code he had written. Since the code consisted of renaming the disarm skill to "disarm shield" and changing the dirt kick skill to "caltraps", I removed them. The areas I removed happily since they were overpowered, except for one area which I had rewritten of his - making it partially mine. Now, if things had been different, I think some people present good arguments here. Dulan's idea that you should be paid because it is considered a job is bunk. Many people consider it a job from their end for all the effort they put into it. I do not believe you should be able to up and wish to have all of your integrated code just right out removed. I don't know the law inside and out, but it would seem to me that the coder is doing "volunteer work" and any property he creates, the mud owner has rights to use. Not distribute, just use. So they want it ripped out... well, you should have thought of that beforehand. Mind you, this is all for free, nonprofit muds I assume, since they are not companies I wager. A profit making mud had better have some contract made up for you. Ask for a copy of your work, or even a copy of the codebase, ask to not have your code just given away for fun, and go about your business. You'll probably realize in six months what utter crap you had written anyways, along with how you could code something 10x cooler more efficiently.