[Year 12 IPM] A quick before-the-exam question

[Keith Richardson]

A question from the prac exam was:

"A young innovative programmer working for SoftEASI (a dynamic software
development company) has developed a unique virtual reality game.
Explain to whom the rights to the game belong under the Copyright
Amendment (Digital Agenda) Act 2000."

The answer claims that because it was undertaken during working hours,
SoftEASI owns the rights to the software, to which I disagree. Unless
the software had some connection to the work being done normally, the
author has copyright over it.

As an analogy, if there is a photojournalist for a newspaper out taking
photos at a sporting tournament, if they take out their mobile phone to
take a personal photo, the company does not own it, the author does.

What do others think?
Keith Richardson
IPM List Moderator
Head of ICT, Leibler Yavneh College
Elsternwick
Ph: 03.9528.4911
k.richardson at yavneh.vic.edu.au