Your code after you are gone

Posted Aug 10, 2011 16:59 UTC (Wed) by tetromino (subscriber, #33846)
In reply to: Your code after you are gone by rleigh
Parent article: Desktop Summit: Copyright assignments

> In the absence of explicitly assigning copyright, what would happen in normal circumstances?

The copyright would pass to your heirs in accordance with your local intestacy laws.

Your code after you are gone

Posted Aug 11, 2011 12:58 UTC (Thu) by kpfleming (subscriber, #23250) [Link]

I've also been told that there are some countries in the world where copyright ownership *reverts* to your estate when you pass away, even if you'd explicitly transferred it to another party in some other country where such laws do not exist. Copyright assignment has many, many pitfalls... including the fact that the receiver of the assignment must ensure that not only does the person making the assignment own the copyrights in question, but that the laws in both the assigner's and assignee's countries allow for such an assignment.