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[loki_racer]

What paperwork do you have people sign to cover yourself?  Say I paid for concept art and want to make sure the concept artist doesn't decide that after launch, he wants part of the revenue.

At some point I'm sure I will have to share my code with people.  What paperwork should I have them sign so I'm covering myself if they decide to "borrow" it.

[Schrompf]

"None" worked for me in the past 10 years.

[Impmaster]

Yeah, if a concept artist wants money afterwards, he generally won't have enough money to bring it to court anyways, so you should be fine.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

you may at least want a receipt so that you can put it on your tax form as a business expense, but other than that i can't think of anything

[Gorgoo]

I'm pretty sure "no paperwork" is bad advice. You probably won't have any problems, but if you do, they could be big ones. I've definitely heard of badly-defined rights sinking projects. It's not always because of malice, or greed, either. Sometimes it can just be a failure of communication.

In fact, just recently, I was reading about Dwimmermount, a Kickstarted tabletop RPG supplement. The situation looks kind of complicated, and I may be misunderstanding, but apparently Autarch, the company running the Kickstarter, was paying a writer to create the supplement. But the writer currently owns the rights to it, and not them. He's facing serious family problems (apparently his father is extremely ill), and hasn't been working on the project, or contacting the company. But they're unable to fulfill the Kickstarter rewards, because technically, he owns the IP. They would be infringing on copyright if they did so without his permission.

I don't know what sort of paperwork you should put together to avoid situations like that. I would be afraid of misleading you if I gave you a wrong answer, based on my incomplete knowledge. But I do know that not signing anything, while it might work out, opens you up to huge potential problems.

I have heard of New Media Rights, which has legal guides for "Internet users and creators". I've seen a few of their videos related to game development, and they seemed pretty good, but that's the extent of my experience with the site. I'm not sure if they'll have what you'll need, but it's worth looking.

[Xienen]

We are pretty loose about this with most people, but we have an NDA, Contributor Agreement, and signed contract with anyone we consider to be a flight risk.

As for protecting your code, a license header in most(or all) source code files stored in a revision system(especially a public one or hosted by someone else) should do the trick.  In court, it'd prolly come down to who has more proof of their claim, rather than some requirement that you can 110% prove that it is absolutely yours....unless you're trying to sue for millions or something =)

I don't think it's generally something to be too worried about, though, honestly.  As someone put it to me many years ago, "do you really believe that what you're doing is so frickin awesome that someone will want to steal it? seriously?"  The reality is that while a lot of us are doing something interesting, 99% of us are not actually something worth stealing.

[loki_racer]

One of my big concerns is a contracted piece being borrowed from somewhere.  After the fiasco that was WarZ, I would hate to get to launch day and find out one of the pieces we commissioned was ripped off from somewhere else.

Contracts and liability agreements (if this is the term) would be critical for lawsuits coming down from the robber IP owners.

My google-fu is strong, but making sure the stuff we've commissioned wasn't stolen isn't the easiest.

Do most indie-game companies use LLC?

[Xienen]

We are an LLC.  As for the contracted pieces being borrowed, that's usually written into the Contributor Agreement.  The idea is that they must own the rights to then be able to transfer the rights on everything they submit over to the project and/or company.

[Muz]

NDA's quite useful for shared code. Agree with reciepts/invoices too.

If he wants part of the revenue, he'd need a signed agreement that he'd get part of the revenue (or at least a copyright on the art or something). You can't just say, "I did this and was paid for it, but didn't get paid enough, but there was no agreement to pay more".

I'm quite wary of these things though, because it's really fucking difficult to enforce laws in my own country much less try to enforce them on someone in another country.

[Mister Dave]

NDAs with everyone who handles proprietary instruments including code, alpha beta or GM builds and so on....

Work-for-hire contracts with everyone who contributes assets including code, artwork, music & sound effects and the like. These contracts outline what is and what is not promised to individual parties.

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"One of my big concerns is a contracted piece being borrowed from somewhere." Make sure your work-for-hire contract stipulates that all work submitted is original.

"and signed contract with anyone we consider to be a flight risk." Not good enough. As my IP attorney asked me: "When the money starts rolling in, are you sure your friends will still be your friends?" It's not an insult to have contracts for all - it's good business. Just ask Mark Zuckerberg. Google "mark zuckerberg lawsuit eduardo savarin" or see this article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/16/people-mark-zuckerberg-burned_n_1518702.html

"In court, it'd prolly come down to who has more proof of their claim, rather than some requirement that you can 110% prove that it is absolutely yours....unless you're trying to sue for millions or something." In court you learn what you should have learned to keep you out of court. Learn at your leisure if that's your way, but you will learn eventually.

"Yeah, if a concept artist wants money afterwards, he generally won't have enough money to bring it to court anyways, so you should be fine." Not familiar with attorneys who work "pro bono"? Got another Google search for you: https://www.google.com/search?q=pro+bono+lawyers&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7DKUS_en

[Mister Dave]

Work-for-hire contracts with everyone who contributes assets including code, artwork, music & sound effects and the like. These contracts outline what is and what is not promised to individual parties.

They also outline the terms for termination of said agreements. You may have the need to fire a contractor who isn't living up to your expectations, or the terms of the agreement.