I’m working on a project that I need external professional help taking from hobby status to potential income opportunity.
My concern is with protecting my ideas and the assets I have created or bought from being misused by whoever I consult with for help.
I accept there is always going to be some level of trust involved but how can I reduce the risks?
it’s always a question of trusting. But anyway, sometimes you sign NDA contract to avoid that (if it happens). you could find exemples concerning cg on the net i think and build your own based on it, and make your partners sign it before giving them your files.
hope it helps
Thanks skuax. I’m probably overthinking it.
It’s not like I have a super original idea but I’d hate to have someone pull the rug out before I make headway in the niche I’m aiming for.
And an NDA might not be worth the effort considering any help I get is likely from a different legal jurisdiction and hard to enforce.
I guess I’ll take my chances at this point unless it looks likely to kick off big time.
Thanks again
Protection of intellectual right is really hard. If you think your ideas big and very valuable, you must take patent. But this is little expensive. And if any infringement, you need to sue, and this is expensive too.
Patents are for inventions, copyright is for everything else like art or those related subjects. It is likely going to be really hard to sue anyone over stolen ideas. Stolen assets on the other hand could find a case because of copyright law, but of course, as you said, it is expensive to do.
You can’t really patent or copyright a general concept like I have. It’s more about using my skills to produce animations for a particular market. Nothing overly complicated but it would be a shame to inadvertently hand over files to an unscrupulous adviser who could throw a heap of money at modelers and animators and bring it to fruition before I can.
NDA is probably not worth the effort considering the cost and difficulty proving guilt
I have signed many NDAs for clients who thought their ideas were valuable, and not once did I ever encounter an idea so good I wanted to steal it. Ideas are not that valuable. I had a bunch of ideas this morning and they’re all great. Like what if your toilet had detachable parts so you could clean it by running it in the dishwasher? See, that idea is fantastic and I just gave it away for free. Don’t care. I’ve got a thousand more
Bed + toilet = gold
Under these conditions, you’ll probably be safer doing everything by yourself…
See, that’s a great idea too! But to steal it, I’d have to build and test a working prototype, file a patent, negotiate with a manufacturer, etc.
In order words, I’d have to do a lot of work. That’s not the point of stealing! The point of stealing is so that I don’t have to do a lot of work. So don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. Go ahead and make your idea a reality, make a lot of money, and then I’ll just steal your wallet.
I’m definitely stealing this idea. I’m tired of shitting the bed ruining my whole day. Just wake up and flush away all your mistakes!
Yeah I’ll just take my chances I guess. Its not like I’ve got a major scientific breakthrough or anything. Theres always other angles and directions I can adapt it to.
BTW how about combining the toilet and dishwasher so every time you flush you wash the dishes too??? 
I have seen toilets with a small sink in the top of the tank. When you flush, the water goes through the sink, then fills the tank. So you can wash your hands after going, with no wasted water.
That’s a good idea as long as you don’t put the pipes in backwards
I have some experience in copywrite issues and I can offer my own experience. If someone does steal your work in some way and you find it, the first thing is you find out who the website host, producer or manufacturer is and then contact a lawyer to issue them a cease and desist, usually that’s the first and most reasonable option especially for indie projects unless you can prove they’ve made thousands of dollars from using your content, then you have a basis to sue right away. In that case you’re most likely going to settle out of court because you’re probably not rich either, most court cases take a year or more and few people can afford to sustain a case that long, the only exception being that a larger company makes such a mistake and a lawyer agrees to represent you in exchange for some percentage of the compensation a judge awards you.
As far as protecting yourself pre-hand, I’ve had instances where I let random coders in different countries access admin accounts for sites and haven’t had problems myself, but I also take the time to do as much screening and research on them as I can and change the passwords and etc afterwords.
Generally professionals with a good reputation don’t do shady stuff like that for a variety of reasons, but of course they’re more expensive so it’s ultimately up to you how you delegate that risk and whether you consider your project worth that extra protection.
For low-stakes projects in saturated markets, an NDA is an okay-ish idea at best and only for more obvious elements, things that you know you have a legal claim to, but not creative elements subject to interpretation which need to be regulated independently by your state’s trademark office and which someone else could trademark before you get the chance. If someone steals your trademarked content, you need to dispute that at a state trademark office.
Even if your hired professional violates the NDA though, you probably wouldn’t know and even if you did, it’s probably not worth your time and effort to dispute it beyond a cease and desist. The current legal system does not have the resources to handle every single case, especially small ones. In reality what mostly stops an idea from being stolen is the fact that there’s millions of ideas and ideas alone don’t pay the bills, people have limited time and resources to invest and reputable professionals lose more money by wasting time and resources on a court case or spontaneously having their own project shut down from a cease and desist.
This isn’t to say you should be careless with reputable people. If you think you have valuable assets that you don’t need to share with whoever you’re hiring, then don’t.
No need for snippy comments, what he’s saying concerns a Lot of us…
I’m curious to know if BLOCKCHAIN could help in this kind of situation - I keep hearing that it’ll help “Prove Ownership” of something in the digital age - does anyone here know about this??
That would basically be the exact same thing as a copyright registry. If you didn’t submit your work to the chain (or more likely a hash of the work) there’s no record of it being yours.
Okay… so what’s to STOP me submitting my work to " the chain" then? …some reason I shouldn’t??
