[Wikimedia-l] Wikimedia Foundation's non-disclosure agreement

[Liam Wyatt]

I had to sign a NDA when I became a "Fellow" three years ago.
It was mailed to me (not emailed) so I don't have a copy to refer
to anymore. But from what I recall it was actually quite sensible and not
"over-reaching". It talked about not publishing other staff's employment
details if you happen to learn it, not sharing passwords etc. As other
people have said in this thread there are several genuinely valid and good
reasons for having a formal agreement. NDA is not inherently bad.

On the other hand, I have been presented with a contract for some work with
one of Chapters - that was clearly just copy/paste from a corporate
organisation - that included NDA sections. It also included several
amusingly irrelevant sections about "returning company equipment" and even
an actually free-culture-incompatible section about how I should "assign
all rights" to the organisation, including copyright and any patents
"current and future" related to my work. Needless to say I didn't sign
that.

This being the case, I do agree there is a genuine need for a standardised
and clear staff agreement - that is public - that the Chapters can use as a
template and so everyone knows what the 'rules' are.

-Liam/Wittylama (no longer a WMF Fellow)


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