that has not been my experience, at least not with the larger companies.
 however should it ever come up i'll definitely negotiate, or not sign. 
and i have just not signed at one company and they let it slide, but
that was a small company.  with companies like ibm or xerox for instance
it's often nearly impossible to get anything in the "standard" agreement
changed.  of course i prefer small companies any way, precisely because
you are dealing with people, not a huge beurocracy with most things case
in stone and yourself being relatively insignificant from their
standpoint.  i'm glad you've managed to negotiate, but as i said i've
seen it be a problem for others with the big companies.  with small
companies usually everything is negotiable, as it should be.  i've
always had outside interest, but kept it outside the company i was
working for.  obviously if you are using company time and equipment it
should be for something related to the company and they have some right
to it.  perhaps things are getting easier to negotiate with many
companies, that would be a good thing for all involved.  oh, and i fixed
the tags on this, a very nice feature.

Olin Lathrop wrote:
> 
> Philip Stortz wrote:
> > as for voluntary agreements, this is the rub.  for many technical people
> > entering into such an agreement in return for employment is not optional
> > as it has become common practice amongst all major companies (at least
> > here in the u.s.), thus if a technical person wishes to be employed in a
> > technical field they do not have any real power to negotiate this point
> > of their employment.
> 
> This is nonsense.  I've negotiated intellectual property agreements as part
> of an employment contract several times.  A lot of the standard contracts do
> say that the company owns everything, but I've found it very easy to push
> back on this.  For example, I'm doing work for a local company currently and
> specifically have permission to persue outside interests as long as I don't
> do it on their time, at their place or using their equipment, and it's not
> related to their business (which happens to be indoor location).  Their
> standard employee agreement doesn't allow for this, but it really wasn't
> very hard to get this changed.  This is probably because they recognize it's
> fair.  This experience was typical of other related situations I've seen or
> been part of.  This is really no different than negotiating salary or any
> other working condition.
-------

-- 
Bush himself, perhaps the truest of Wilson's disciples, has gone even
further, declaring the United
States' purpose is to eliminate evil itself.--<http://fairuse.1accesshost.com/news2/latimes386.htm>
Does Bush think he is doing God's will, or does he think he is God? 
Such men are always remembered
as the Lunatic tyrants they are, eventually.
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