# Multimedia rights

Now complete Activity 2.

## Activity 2: Multimedia rights

Imagine you’ve been teaching mathematics for several years and have developed your own individual way to explain the key concepts of set theory, involving the students playing a game. You now decide to publish your method of teaching and the game as a multimedia product with an accompanying book. You will write the book but need to hire a developer to produce the multimedia component, to your speciﬁcation. You plan to sell the combined product via a well-known publisher. What rights should you have? What rights should the multimedia developer and publisher have?

### Discussion

Since the basic ideas are yours, it would seem sensible to retain these. As the employer of the multimedia developer you may well automatically own the actual multimedia software produced and the employee would gain no rights over the software – but it would be wise to spell this out in the contract of employment.

When entering into the agreement with the publisher, all you need grant are the copying and distribution rights, retaining all other rights for yourself. Standard publishers’ agreements are very likely to demand assignment of copyright to the publisher, but this is not necessary and some publishers are happy not to demand this.

OpenLearn - Software and the law
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