Social Media Systems Social Media Marketing and Website Design Company

Click stars to vote (left is low, right is high)

PART 2 - What’s the Deal With Contracts, Copyright and Web Related Services?

Okay, we’ve covered copyright and contract issues for clients; now its time to examine how they affect service providers. Service providers, like their clients, almost always benefit from a contract, especially if they’ve agreed to relinquish their rights to any finished work. This holds especially true in the freelance world, where service providers are generally more susceptible to getting screwed over by various companies.

This is why a contract can be one of the most valuable tools ion the proverbial service provider’s tool box. Whether you are a freelance web designer, graphic designer copywriter or anything in between, accepting a new project entails a ton of responsibility. Ensuring you keep a solid history of records via tightly controlled invoices, emails and other valuable correspondence can ensure your rights are protected. Like your clients, you don’t necessarily need a lawyer to make a contract agreeable and convenient for both client and service provider.

Rights to work are another important aspect of a contract and are a key component to ensuring designers and service providers lay out the specifics of a project and how it is going to work. This can take the form of a simple proposal that is signed by both parties; it doesn’t it need to be really long filled legal jargon to make a solid agreement between client and service provider.

Like I mentioned in the previous post, one of the most common arguments between designers and clients stems from a lack of understanding of the terms. The end of a project is not the time to be surprised by all your work getting ripped off without payment (sadly, this does in deed happen quite a bit).

Fortunately, there are a number of ways you can make it easier on yourself, the first and foremost being, of course, a contract. This doesn’t always prohibit someone from taking advantage of you or your work, but may inhibit certain negative behavior. If a company knows you’ll report them or thinks you’ll uphold your contract, they’re much less likely to break it. Secondly, always get a minimum amount up front, no exceptions. This way if you do get screwed, you are not only protected with a contract but money down for the work put into it.

If rights to work are important, keep in mind that the moment a piece of work is created, it is the property of the creator. Thus it is legally the property of the designer, writer, programmer etc. who made it, even if they sell it to a client. A service provider must transfer any rights to materials directly to the client, via written agreement, in the event they choose to relinquish rights.

A large number of freelance professionals simply include these rights in their services; still others maintain all rights to materials and concepts. On one hand, this messes the client up a bit, as it results in them not having easy, needed access to important materials. On the other, keeping credit and rights to materials can be integral to a freelancer’s profession, will allow them to control what happens with the materials and ensure their work isn’t modified.

Think of it this way: if it�s a $300 project, most professionals will probably relinquish any rights; if it�s a huge 10,000 project that incorporates major branding and marketing, the service provider will likely want to keep rights to the materials and final product.

A decent compromise if you do give up all rights to your materials is to include a clause in your contract stating that you must be credited for any and all work done even after you transfer rights and materials to a client.

Ultimately, giving up rights to materials and creating a contract between you and a client is a matter of personal choice, but is a solid way to protect your own interests and those of your client. After you sign a contract, you’re on level ground and can start a project knowing that all the details have been ironed out. One more thing to remember is that the more detail, the better. Leave nothing ‘open ended’ unless its in your best interests; however, specifics are almost always preferred.

Here are the other parts to this series:

INTRODUCTION

PART 1 - Clients

[tags]web design contract, copyright, freelance contracts, copyright infringement, creating a contract[\tags]

Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment. PLEASE register now and you'll be able to fill out a profile, upload an avatar or picture of yourself and get a FREE link to your website. After commenting you can use the same login to join in our forum discussions. If you haven't done so already subscribe to this site. We're always adding new information and we would love to have you participate.

Join the Discussion in Our Social Media Marketing Forums