Well, that sure sounds like a resolution to me, Eric!
You took possession, the say you take possession and did nothing to prevent you from taking possession, so that sounds like they gave tacit approval.

Where it generally hits the news is when, for instance, a chemist at a drug company makes some kind of breakthrough and wants to capitalize on it personally, or when a software engineer wants to set up shop using a program he developed while working for someone else. And where it becomes more interesting is when the thing that the fellow developed was something he did in his garage and that was somewhat tangential to his actual job, but that he then let the company use in their operations and now wants to market to other companies as well, only his employer claims ownership.

When I was running educational programs for a daily paper, I began writing serialized stories because the ones we could get from other sources were pretty lame. But I did it with a clear understanding — I retained copyright to the text, the artists I used retained rights to their illustrations and the company, in exchange for allowing use of their software and equipment, as well as covering some mailing and marketing expenses, got 50% of the gross sales to other papers.

When our paper changed hands, I dropped a memo to my boss restating the terms of the arrangement, just to establish a paper trail.

And when I quit, I first backed up all my stories and pics to disk and took them home, deleted the materials from the servers at work, and then told the company that I was leaving.

Trust in Allah, but tie up your camel.

That’s a very good point. If he didn’t need to get permission from the paper to give or sell any of the original art, then that would a strong indication of ownership by Brian Duffy.

It may be that the paper has tried to claim BOTH positions ( which it cannot ). They may have undercut themselves with such a move.

Milt Priggee’s observation about precedence is likely to be the determinative factor. The way that the proceeds were divvied concerning the secondary publications of the previous published works should make it clear to a court just who thought what belonged to whom.

( Also, did Duffy ever sell or give away any of his originals? Who made those decisions, and who benefitted? )

The general manager, who hated my guts, responded with a “generous” offer that would allow me to have 12 (that’s it!) of my originals and I would be allowed to make copies of the other cartoons for a fee of $1 each.

There’s nothing like the kick in the gut of losing your job to be followed by the kick in the crotch over your originals.

I did subsequently find a way to get my hands on most of my stuff, which I’m sure would otherwise have gone in the trash.

The cartoons I do for my full time employer are done on company time, and as such, they own the resulting artwork. Duffy must have known that would be the stance of the paper should things go south.

While novel and maybe even worth the Hail Mary, he’ll have a very difficult time proving they terminated him with the tax write off in mind.

That said, this behavior is morally dubious at best on the part of the Register. First they kicked him to the curb, then they frogmarched him out of the building and confiscated his building ID, now this?

And people wonder what happened to employee loyalty.

Take the originals home with you every day. Make a copy of them to keep on file at the office.