Alexander Sergeev's blog

I had a clash about credits in my program some time ago.

The company that ordered this program from me strictly prohibited to notice my name and my site in the credits.
I signed up, but I can’t say I share this position and I would like to explain, why (maybe, Eugene is reading this article right now and it will change his mind? This is one of the reasons why I’m writing this post, by the way).

I will not touch the questions of law and ethics of the credits prohibition (although, from the side of law and ethics the problem can be resolved easier).
I will explain my position from the side of the potential prohibiter – the businessman, who do not now should he give credits or not.

So, why credits prohibition is a weak position for you business?

Let’s find out the possible reason of such behaviour. (Leave aside the possible messy design of the “About” screen; there are a lot of ways to solve this problem).
I see the only one strong reason – the wish to hide the names (and contacts, thanks to Facebook) of the workers.

So the question is “why do I want to hide the names of the workers”.
The best reason that I invented is “I’m afraid that my potential customers will address directly to my worker(s), not to my company”.

This is a fail for a number of reasons:

• There should be an obvious reason why the customers should appeal to your company. If there is no such a reason – I have a bad news for you: you are out (it’s just a matter of time). There are some ways to create a program: you can hire programmer or order an application from a software company. There many reasons why the second way is often preferable. You should make accent on these reasons and do not try to kill all freelancers in the world.
• You assume that your workers can compete with your company and even win in this competition. If this is really true, your business is in danger, because looks like that you are not in it (but if your company is more than just a simple sum of its parts then you are ok). From other side you are turning your workers against yourself. “If he thinks that I’m as strong as he, I am strong as he.” You lost at the moment when you started to compare your business and you workers.
• Business is some kind of collaboration, isn’t it? By rejecting the idea of showing the names of your workers your are giving a message to them that they are not a part of the team (and you are turning them against you, again).
• You should be proud of your workers and provide their names proudly in your product. The workers should be proud of working in a such nice company and proudly observe their names in the credits list. There is no intersection of interests: the interests of the company do not intersect with the interests of the workers (until one your workers decides to raise his own business). You can promote your workers, they will glorify you – and everyone will be happy.

I’m not sure if the idea of competition between worker(s) and company is right. By the way, this is the only reason I found out.
Maybe you have other ideas?