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A comment on Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the U.S. on an L1B visa. Parent comment

Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by 762236 on Sunday June 14, 2020 @01:03PM (#23519318)
It's hard to imagine moving away from California and its moonlighting law. With it, I own everything I conceive of and work on during my own time, as long as it doesn't conflict with what I do at work. I'd imagine that if you relocated here (your company probably has an office in Silicon Valley), many of your restrictions would be lifted.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by dylan604 on Sunday June 14, 2020 @05:23PM (#23521513)
A company in California that I worked for allowed me to list all side projects that I was working on to exempt them from the "we own your brain" type of paperwork. This allowed be to continue those projects. However, any new projects would be subject to company ownership.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by NotSammyHagar on Sunday June 14, 2020 @06:26PM (#23521911)
I am not a lawyer, but it is my understanding that in california even though your contract might give you permission to own what you do, you do own it regardless if you do it in your own time. that's the common understanding.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by asdff on Monday June 15, 2020 @02:04PM (#23530751)
Jeez I would list 300 things with nondescript names even if I had no side projects to get around that ridiculous rule.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by saagarjha on Sunday June 14, 2020 @02:33PM (#23520027)
I worked for a large company in California and the law prevented me from doing just about anything because it could be plausibly construed as conflicting with the company's business.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by gnopgnip on Sunday June 14, 2020 @02:53PM (#23520246)
The law is much more favorable to employees, and the legal definition of conflict of interest is more narrow than the company would like you to believe.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by saagarjha on Sunday June 14, 2020 @02:56PM (#23520279)
Oh, I'm sure it is. The problem is that they could sue me anyways.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by pas on Monday June 15, 2020 @06:28AM (#23525834)
That can happen any time anyway. But they would have to show damages. And even though you'd be on the hook for legal fees - at least initially, defending such a simple civil suit isn't that big of a deal financially.

Or ... just do open source under an alias.

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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by codemac on Sunday June 14, 2020 @08:56PM (#23522824)
Agreed, they're trying to scare folks.

When I looked into something similar I found that while companies will fight tooth and nail to not sign away rights to a specific idea/effort, the law is very much on the employee's side as long as you don't use corporate equipment to do it.

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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by codemac on Sunday June 14, 2020 @08:56PM (#23522822)
Agreed, they'hen I looked into something similar I found that while companies will fight tooth and nail to not sign away rights to a specific idea/effort, the law is very much on the employee's side as long as you don't use corporate equipment to do it.
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Re:Amazon added a non-compete after the employee entered the... by ashtonkem on Sunday June 14, 2020 @10:09PM (#23523155)
There are three issues here intermingled.

1) Competing with your current company while moonlighting.

2) Leaving your current company and using any knowledge you gained there against them.

3) Leaving your current company and using your skill set at an unrelated company.

Contracts forbidding 1 & 2 are usually defensible both morally and legally. It’s 3 where the metaphorical water gets murky, since overly broad contracts of this type basically deny workers the ability to work and earn money for the duration of the noncompete, if enforced.

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