legalese

I (Carter Pape) own the source code for this website (carterpape.com) and license it under the The GNU General Public License, version 3.0. I reserve the right to upgrade the license to newer versions of The GNU General Public License.

Except where otherwise noted, I own the content of this website and license it under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

This website uses intellectual properties referenced in the website’s source code and some creative works. Though the properties are publicly licensed, the licensors have not endorsed me or the use of their properties.

Some properties used are accompanied by attribution and licensing notes. If you believe proper attribution is missing for any properties, contact me.

Icons for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and GitHub are trademarks of the respective owners. Their use does not indicate endorsement of me by the trademark owner, nor vice versa.

The following icons are by Font Awesome, licensed CC BY 4.0:

• award icon (I modified the original by adding a stroke and sheen)
• Facebook icon
• Twitter icon
• GitHub icon
• Instagram icon

what “licensed for exclusive use” means

In cases where a work belongs to The Times-Independent, the work is licensed exclusively for use by the newspaper or reuse by me. This means that others are not permitted to use the work without the express, written consent of the newspaper’s editor or publisher.

I label works to which this applies as being “licensed for exclusive use”. For example:

I like to give photos away (i.e. publish them under my preferred Creative Commons license). But, sometimes, I am merely reusing a photo that is licensed exclusively to The Times-Independent (i.e. that only the newspaper is allowed to use).

In cases where I have taken a photo that I intend for The Times-Independent to use, the newspaper, by federal law, owns the work.

Here’s the intuition behind it: The Times-Independent hired me to report, so they own the works I produce in the course of doing that hired work. That includes all work products: reports, photographs, videos, even (arguably) source code.

Of course, not every photo I take or program I create belongs to my employer. It is only the works for hire, which by law includes “a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment.”

What’s within the scope of my employment? Well, that’s arguable, but I think it clearly does not include photos that I take for the intention of openly licensed use, nor programs that I write for myself rather than for the newspaper.

Examples of some works that belong to me rather than my employer are photos that I create for or publish first for other entities, including for myself. Some programs I have created that relate to my job but are outside the scope of my employment also count.

However, in cases where I have created a work (e.g. a photograph) for The Times-Independent, the newspaper owns the work and has its own licensing and reuse terms. Those terms tend to be restrictive because the newspaper prefers to protect rather than give away its intellectual property.