>>Another piece of copyright law pertains to ownership of data.
>
>What piece? Please site the relevant section of section 17 of the US Code...
I'll look it up. I think its a case from the 5th Circut. If you have ever read agreements to purchase high end data feeds (like Bloomberg), you will notice a a bunch of BOLD print prohibiting resale of the data, regardless of the format. In some cases, that will only make the agreement with your users. IOW, any propietary data your system needs to purchase, will need to be serviced through an enduser license with your customer.
>
>
><
>An independent contractor, converting data from a legacy format to a newer format, might have claims to the data in the new format.
>>
>
>Might??? What basis do you make this conclusion?
"Might" means this. The first court your case is heard by are local courts. The judges are elected - sometimes old -sometimes not even lawyers - and probably part of the good - ole - boy system that runs things down at county/city and even state. In most cases, the author/developer is the little guy. He has not money campaign coffers. The author/developer is up against someone that had the resources to hire him and propbably has (also) been lining the good-ole-boy pockets.

So your first claim is in a lower court. The judge may think, regardless of how precise the law reads, that the guy paying for it, owns the rights (money = ownership), which is not what copyright laws say. And, probably, the judge attends those same fund raisers as the guy the author/developer has filed (or is defending) a claim against (plaintiff or defendent). Local, elected judges don't care if you appeal it. Their need is to protect the good-ole-boy system.

RULE 1: You will always have to appeal any copyright claim. Copyright protection is a federal right. State and lower courts tend to favor the guy that thinks - despite any agreement (or lack of), he owns the publishing (or copy) rights to an original work. NOT SO! Sometimes the company paying the author will shovel the old hussle: "Look keep your rates low, and we'll help you market it after it's done" - The project is completed, and then they might change to: "Well now we own it, SEND us the source code!"
>
>If I the company that is contracting your services have title to data that you assist me in converting from one format to anohter, how are my claims to title affected by your actions?
Well - I could go out and re-sale it - unless we had an agreement that I copuldn't)
>
>This by the way, is an invitation to you to make a convincing argument....
>
>
>>This one is interesting: A copyright cannot be applied to a formula or equation
>
>What does this have to do with the topic of conversation????
Just a side bar about what can be copyrighted and what cannot. I read it in a general copyright discussion pamplet. Imagine all the royalties that could rise from the simple calculation of the area of a circle (or triangle)
>
>
>>In recent years, congress has been limiting the protections of patents. Inventors have been loosing to big corporate interests. Actors are loosing royalty fees for commercials. And, if those sites you offered are any indication, so goes the authors' copyright protections. Go figure: Inovation is becoming a commodity!
>>
>
>The topic here is copyright law, not patent law.....< s >.... The two are very distinct.....
There distinct- but both are intellectual property - the establishment does NOT want to pay royalities for patents or copyrights. Look at MS. Was 5K or 50K that BG paid for DR DOS that got the ball rolling. Imagine where MS might be, if a royalty, rather than an outright purchase of rights to DOS was transacted. The world would be a lot different.