Project Management Ethics?

#1 If you havent sorted this out early on in your contracts then you might be walking into a lot of trouble if you use their work regardless. You will need to settle in writing exactly what the contributor will recieve if successful. Otherwise your probably better off getting their contribution redone.

#2 I don't see why someone would treat someone badly. Unless they deserved it. I would totally use their work even if they were kicked out I would still give them the money and credit they deserve for their work but I'd still use it. Like if you have a coder and he makes an inventory system, later he quits, your not going to rip the code out of your game just because he quit. Why wouldn't you tell someone that you don't need them when they are away? I figure if I don't like them, why would I want them on my team? So, I never treat anyone on my team as an outcast because we are all friends :)

So... Yes, I am ethical.

edit: I agree with Adrian.

#3 It wasn't on my terms, a mod team just did this to me. I told the leader, and co-leader in early november i had real life stuff to deal with. Then they said they were going to release on november 30th (they told me a week before. Which made me unable to merge my works.), so i showed them my work, and uploaded it for them. So they could use it, and now i login to the forums and all my work is gone, so i delete my stuff off the network. Contact the leader, and he says i have been terminated, and said all these excuses which i countered, and he backed down, so i told him to delete any backups of my work he has. As far as i know he did it.

I run a game team, so i just wanted to know from others if there was a underlying "Project Ethics" code thats not written in stone.

Edit: GG probably wasn't the best place to post this, so i'm sorry if i caused any issues.

#4 No-one I've ever worked with on my games has ever contributed anything except for over-ambitious concepts. Thats what you get for employing Year 8's I guess...

#5 Wow thats a toughy. Remote teams are hard to manage. But it also means that there needs to be some flexibility. When you have team members working for for nothing except royalties I think a certain ammount of understanding is required. Often real life does interfere and as your not getting paid and chances of success are slim at best. I think its your right to be treated fairly and with some consideration.

In order to keep their work in your game in the inventory system. You would have to negotiate how much that alone is worth. Quite often a team will form with compensation to an % agrred on from the start.

If all someone produced was an inventory system, and there were only 3 team members shared equaly with 25% left over for building the business. I don't think a simple inventory system is going to be worth 25% of the profits. That may be a weeks contribution, to 6-8+ months of solid work by the other members.

As far as Chris's situation goes, I think he's going to have to watch the team carefully and see if there is any evidence of them using his work without his permission.

Did he sign some kind of contract early on, and if so what was stated on it. It's easy to get cheated out of your contribution if there aren't measures for these kinds of situations included.

I don't think you can trust any indie team blindly. Situations can change and people aren't always who they seem. I think it's a little naieve to expect everyone to be above board, honest and willing to do the right thing. In the majority of cases it is the case. But they aren't the ones that you have to worry about.

#6 Adrian: If they use it let them, no i didn't sign any contracts or all. It was a mod for a game, so no contracts. At any rate, it doesn't matter anymore. They're probably gonna bash my name, saying i was unreasonable etc. So, its no matter, i have my own issues. --- College Financial Aid Paperwork sucks.

#7 I find mod teams to be extremely shady and drama-magnetic enterprises, for the most part. The ones I've tried to be in don't get off the ground because nobody's serious about the work. The ones that work usually come from close personal relationships, and in those, sooner or later there's some betrayal that hurts the project. Also, because the mod isn't a paying employer, changes in work situation(such as what happened here) can leave the project drifting indefinitely. Since few mods, even today, want to take an open-source approach, they are organizationally disadvantaged in almost every way; they have no surefire means for sustainability. Mods that can beat the odds and make it to public release are correspondingly quite rare.

If you're working in an entirely commercial environment(even an indie one) where it is understood that all work will be paid for, even in royalties, you can probably expect a different level of professionalism; at the very least there should be a legally binding contract involved. That doesn't mean you don't take a risk in commercial development jobs, of course, it just means the system is set up in a way that in theory lets you better protect yourself.

#8 Chris,

One of the reasons I left the game biz and am now working indi is because of ethics, or lack there of.

I could make all sorts of examples correlating the game industry to the motion picture industry and its back biting and cut throat ways, or to politics, etc. But the reality is that the world has more than its due share of @$$holes and you are going to encounter them in life.

If this is the biggest challenge you ever face, you will lead a blessed life.

The best thing you can do is let it go, learn from it but don't be diluted by it, and move on. There are good ethical people out there. Be one.

The best revenge is success ...if you are into revenge that is.

#9 @Todd, indeed those are words of wisdom. Yea, i think i'm going away from the mod world for quite some time.

#10 I wanted to jump in here on the "other side" for just one moment, and:

[soapbox]
I've seen this in many many circumstances in volunteer, unpaid, and un-contract encumbered remote projects, but why do people think that they should have the right to repeal work they have submitted previously for any project simply due to the way they may have left (or been forced out of) the project?

When you volunteer to do unpaid work for a team of any sort, there is an inherent assumption that the work you contribute is, and always will be, available for that team/project to continue to use once you leave the project, whatever the reasons. While I'm not in any way bashing you or trying to downplay what happened to you (it sucks, have seen it before myself), it is my opinion that when you submit volunteer work for a project of any sort, you can't "take your bat and go home" if you don't like something about how the relationship works out.

[/soapbox]

#11 It all depends I guess, If its something one person has done like for example textured a model, then I won't use the texture.

But lets say a modeler creates a character, then another team member textures it and a 3rd animates I'll keep it.

I email them and let them know if they don't want us to use the work to let me know, if they never get back to me I assume it means they don't care.

I'll still give them a bonus depending on work done and give them credit for their work

#12 I disagree, but you have to state your intentions before you start. Many people join a team hoping to make good with some kind of indie business. I no longer trust anyone enough to work without a contract that will let me take my work back should things go sour.

I expect to get compensated one way or another, or will walk away with my work, which could be sold or used elsewhere. I'm not in development as a hobby or for fun. Or to get some kind of celebrity status amongst my peers.

You shouldn't quit your day job, but unless you benefit from your work, you should within reason be able to walk away and take your contribution. It all depends on the circumastances.

#13 @Chris, I would not recommend leaving the mod community because of the group you had this trouble with. If making games and working in the indi community is something you love, don't let this bad experience take that away from you.

@ Stephen, You are absolutely right.

And Chris, If you want some special revision that says you get to pull your work if you leave a project, then that needs to be specified from the start. And it would by the way be the first time I have ever seen such and agreement and probably make people not want to start a project with you in the first place.

Not all business relationships work out to be cake ...Mmmm cake.., some just go rotten, but the more professional you are about your approach to this sort of thing the fewer, you will find, will go bad on you.

But like I said, the world is full of @ssholes, and learning to deal with them is just part of life.

#14

Quote:why do people think that they should have the right to repeal work they have submitted previously for any project simply due to the way they may have left (or been forced out of) the project?

Strictly speaking, it's probably because copyright law does in fact grant them that right. ;)

And I don't think it's ethically or morally wrong at all to withdraw all the support you can from a group that you feel has treated you badly. Turnabout is fair play and all that.

At least in situations where you haven't come to an agreement before hand - which all projects, volunteer or commerical, should know to do by now.

#15 For better or worse, you should think of a company as being efficient, not moral.

That said, the way you enforce morality is by legally binding contracts that state the exact bounds of an agreement. This is the way you protect yourself, and the company protects itself from problems.


A good example:
I was approached to write a 'content player' for a custom hardware platform (win CE) in aprox 3 weeks. That's great and all, and doable, but am I going to do that (v1 was requested by Jan 12th) without any contract binding the agreement? hell no. Turns out the company was unwilling to make any financial commitment. And without a commitment there is no way in hell that I (or anyone else) should do any work for them.

#16 Heh I wonder if thats the same guy that contacted me about doing a player, and some graphics for a seperate game. Sounds almost identical except for the WinCE part.

Someone else ended up doing it and posted on a forum about not getting paid and no one answering phones etc.

#17 Firstly, this post was theoretical Alex, and i never pointed RTB out, in fact i don't think i ever said RTB, or your name. I was using RTB as an example.

Quote:
About a week later, he told a couple of us that he wouldn't be around to help with RTB, and to give him warning when we have a release date set, so that he could contribute all his finished work.

No. What i said was i couldn't help for a while. I never said indefinently! And i also asked for ATLEAST a week's notice. I also said i would be away from all of RTB, and you need to notify me.

Quote:
We set the release for Nov. 30th, and told Digi that right when we decided it. We ended up not getting any response from Digi until about the day before release.

Firstly, no one ever told me about the date, untill ABOUT november 26- 28th. That is when Rititundo said the date was on the 30th. He started the conversation out with a "So is your mod work done yet?". Then told me about the date. I told him to just skip me, i'll put it in for the next release.

Quote:
We could get into the details of other reasons for things not working out between Digi and the rest of the team, but they aren't really relevant to the issue at hand.

For those that want to know: There was name calling (by me to them), and whenever Alex/Rititundo got together they treated me like an outcast. Not important but should be cleared up.

Quote:
but his stay with us has delayed our release by a long time (we still haven't released this version yet). That being said, there is very little chance we would be willing to take him on the team for anything in the future.

Mocheeze, as my Staff Seargent says "I'm gonna pull out the BullShit Flag". The reason for this is because A. There is no contracts, my work was indefinent and you and the rest of the team knew that.
B. I said when i started makeing my changed to continue your work, and i would port it over.
C. My work only took me 3 - 4 weeks to do, and thats with a 90% completion rate.

That being said, this is hardly the time or place to settle our differences. If you insist upon talking about RTB, and such, then IM me, don't fill the GG Boards up with these sort of Mod Issues. My post was entirely theoretical, and if it seemed it wasn't to anyone else, i appologize but that was the meaning of it. I had no intention of stateing the persons/parties and how they've betrayed me, i just wanted to know if other developers felt the same i do about moral obligations.

Edit: Somehow, the fragment "No," ended up at the bottom of my post? Mmm

#18 I have been doing some texture work for a Half-Life 2 mod team; DreamScape: Pin Point Blank, and they are really nice people. I havent done much for them yet, because I dont have my camera yet, but they have been really cool. I would hate to be in a team that was a bunch of jerks. That would suck alot, best thing is not get involved with teams like that and join/make a nice team!:)

#19 Ok guys, please take all further inter-team discussions to a your own forums.

And yes, even for "free/volunteer" mods or other types of projects I highly suggest at least a project membership and release of ownership of work agreement to be signed. I've seen cases like this all the time, and it sucks, but it seems to be human nature.

#20 If you keep thinking so, then why do you keep replying Alex? I'm stopping replying after my post, let this thread die off again, like it was.