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dmayorga
Community Member

Royalty-free

As a client, am I allowed to request a short piece of music to be composed and that in paying for it I am granted full ownership and no royalties are owed?

8 REPLIES 8
jr-translation
Community Member


The User Agreement says:   Ownership of Work Product and Intellectual Property

Upon Freelancer’s receipt of full payment from Client, the Work Product, including without limitation all Intellectual Property Rights in the Work Product, will be the sole and exclusive property of Client, and Client will be deemed to be the author thereof. If Freelancer has any Intellectual Property Rights to the Work Product that are not owned by Client upon Freelancer’s receipt of payment from Client, Freelancer hereby automatically irrevocably assigns to Client all right, title and interest worldwide in and to such Intellectual Property Rights. Except as set forth above, Freelancer retains no rights to use, and will not challenge the validity of Client’s ownership in, such Intellectual Property Rights. Freelancer hereby waives any moral rights, rights of paternity, integrity, disclosure and withdrawal or inalienable rights under applicable law in and to the Work Product. If payment is made only for partial delivery of Work Product, the assignment described herein applies only to the portion of Work Product delivered.

License to or Waiver of Other Rights

If Freelancer has any right to the Work Product, including without limitation any Intellectual Property Right, that cannot be assigned to Client by Freelancer, Freelancer hereby automatically, upon Freelancer’s receipt of full payment from Client, unconditionally and irrevocably grants to Client during the term of such rights, an exclusive, even as to Freelancer, irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, fully-paid and royalty-free license to such rights, with rights to sublicense through multiple levels of sublicensees, to reproduce, make derivative works of, distribute, publicly perform and publicly display in any form or medium, whether now known or later developed, make, use, sell, import, offer for sale and exercise any and all such rights. If Freelancer has any rights to such Work Product that cannot be assigned or licensed, Freelancer hereby automatically, upon Freelancer’s receipt of payment from Client, unconditionally and irrevocably waives the enforcement of such rights, and all claims and causes of action of any kind against Client or related to Client’s customers, with respect to such rights, and will, at Client’s request and expense, consent to and join in any action to enforce such rights.  If payment is made only for partial delivery of Work Product, the grant described herein applies only to the portion of Work Product delivered.



 

Thank you.

 

Wow, so it looks like in-short, I essentially 100% own what I pay for.

kat303
Community Member

Dolan - unless the freelancer states differently, and if so, IMO I would then choose another freelancer, in the contract or proposal, then you own 100% ownership and can then do whatever you like with it as long as you fully pay for it,

 

NOTE: if you do NOT fully pay for your job, then even though you may receive the finished results, you do not have ownership or copyright to it and if it's found anywhere, internet or elsewhere the freelancer can have it taken down with a DMCA notice.

Dolan, as Kathy said - with the additional suggestion that you state in a contract that your ownership of the music / jingle/ etc. includes you owning the rights to any and/or all residuals.

 

If you don't want to bother with a contract at least state this in your RFP. That document becomes part of your workroom when(if) the job is awarded.

I can't find any of this text in the User Agreement. Has it been removed, or placed elsewhere?

re: "Wow, so it looks like in-short, I essentially 100% own what I pay for."

 

Yes.

That is the intention of Upwork's default agreement between clients and freelancers.

 

And the overwhelming majority of Upwork freelancers completely understand and agree with this, and have no interest in trying to claim ownership rights associated with the work they deliver to you.

 

If this is important to you, and if you have any doubts, just ask the freelancer if this is her understanding before you officially hire her. If she agrees, and if you don't create any alternative contract, then there's no problem. If she says that she wants to retain any kind of ownership over the work prodcut, then you can politely decline to hire her. She might be right for other projects, but not this particular project.

There is always some digging involved:

 

Terms of Use

Found it under "Optional Service Contract Terms", which are included by default but titled optional as they can be superseded on agreement between freelancer and client. 

https://www.upwork.com/legal#optional-service-contract-terms

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