Were my ideas stolen? If so, could I have done anything to prevent it?

October 4, 2006 3:57 PM

I sent an e-mail of panel ideas after an interview to a woman hiring for a well regarded film festival. I did not get the job but when I was looking at the panels months later, I was surprised to find most of my ideas were being used. Was there any way to protect myself?

I interviewed for this job years ago when I was a few months out of college, but it still bothers me today and I just wanted to ask the community their opinion so I can let it go.

A friend of a woman I was interning for was looking for a panel assistant. I was grateful for my resume being passed on and I went to the interview. It went well and at the end, the interviewer thanked me and requested that I e-mail her panel ideas along with a short write up so she could get an idea if I had a good feel of the film industry and what would make a good panel discussion.

I did so and I got an e-mail back that was positive. She said they were great ideas and that one of them was something they were thinking about developing already, so I was on the right track.

I never heard from her again. I was disappointed but I knew I couldn't dwell on it.

But months later, when the film festival was releasing their information about their schedule, I couldn't help but look at their panels. I was quite shocked to see that most of the ideas I e-mailed months earlier were being used. I felt angry but I didn't do anything because I thought I couldn't.

Was there anything I could have done? Preventatively or after the fact? Did they actually steal my ideas or was I so on the track that this was going to be done anyway?

posted by spec80 to work & money (15 comments total)

Sounds like you took a gamble and lost. You offered your prospective employer something for free, as bait for the possible hire. Not an unreasonable gamble.

However, you used too much bait. Your email probably did all the work they were thinking about hiring you for, so there was then no need to sign you on.

You'll know better next time.
posted by ikkyu2 at 4:03 PM on October 4, 2006

if you want to cause a hickup blog about it. public shaming works especially well when people find their own names on the first google page. be sure to write just about your impression of the events. you can't prove you're the only one who actually had those ideas.
posted by krautland at 4:10 PM on October 4, 2006

Blog all about it. Display your email, link each of your ideas to the festival site pages, if they're still up. This way you can "out" the "thieves" ad possibly get good publicity for yourself.

Note: don't act bitter or vindictive, that'll scare off potential employers. Instead, talk about how delighted you are your ideas were used, and how you have many more ideas.
posted by orthogonality at 4:10 PM on October 4, 2006

You may wish to review the following two previous AskMe threads:

• Can a producer poach ideas from prospective employees?
• How do I protect my idea when presenting it to a potential partner?

In particular, the first of these two threads seems similar to your situation.
posted by RichardP at 4:13 PM on October 4, 2006 [1 favorite]

...so she could get an idea if I had a good feel of the film industry...

Sounds like you have a good feel of the industry now.

Don't dwell on it—but remember how this woman treated you next time you cross paths. (If you stay in the industry, you will cross paths again.)

On preview: don't name names on a website—that's just petty, bitter and vindictive. Just keep on doing well with what you're doing now, and make sure that your buddies in the biz know the whole story.
posted by infinitewindow at 4:16 PM on October 4, 2006

It's my understanding that this sort of thing happens all the time in the film industry, and the basic advice is this: unfortunately you're probably going to have to suck it up. If you're smart enough to come up with the idea in the first place, you'll think of something else. The silver lining is that they'll probably screw up the implementation of your idea anyway, the no-idea-having bastards.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 4:16 PM on October 4, 2006

You may have to accept that the ideas you had were bubbling around in the zeitgeist at the time and that they were thus not as original (and "proprietary") as you seem to think.
posted by zadcat at 4:18 PM on October 4, 2006

I interviewed for this job years ago when I was a few months out of college, but it still bothers me today and I just wanted to ask the community their opinion so I can let it go.


Why does it still bother you? Why do you need help in letting this go? It was one job, years ago, was it really that important?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:27 PM on October 4, 2006

"Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation."

--Thomas Jefferson
posted by jellicle at 6:49 PM on October 4, 2006 [1 favorite]

I'm with zadcat. You really don't know whether your ideas were stolen, or whether someone else had similar ideas. A lot of ideas arise simultaneously in many different people. What really takes talent and dedication is the execution of those ideas.
posted by bingo at 10:56 PM on October 4, 2006

Ideas are cheap, particularly for something as ephemeral as a film festival. Yeah, maybe they ripped you off to some extent, but let it go, you have to accept that when you discuss ideas they're out there and some people will abuse your openness.

(Years ago I consciously decided to take a 'plenty more where that came from' attitude, so I now freely give advice to potential clients before there's any payment or commitment involved. If they want to take all the ideas elsewhere and use them that's absolutely fine, I'd rather not work with someone who isn't keen to work with me, and the cheaper person they hire will probably screw it all up anyway ;) )
posted by malevolent at 11:30 PM on October 4, 2006 [1 favorite]

Let me guess-- Tribeca film festival?
posted by dersins at 4:14 AM on October 5, 2006

Yes, dersins. It was the Tribeca Film Festival. How'd you know?
posted by spec80 at 12:27 PM on October 5, 2006

I used to know someone who had something to do with organizing the Tribeca film festival. If the person I knew was in any way representative of the other folks who work there, what happened to you does not surprise me in the slightest. Hell it may even have been the same person. Email's in the profile if you want to compare notes...
posted by dersins at 1:00 PM on October 5, 2006

Brandon Blatcher:

The reason why I still sometimes think about this experience is because I was a recent college graduate interning in a big city. I didn't really know what was proper protocol within the field as well as being in such a large market and I didn't know if I learned any lessons. All I did was brush it off due to my inexperience but it just hasn't sat well all this time.

Obviously, something happened that I wasn't happy with and if I don't learn anything from it to not let it happen again, it stays in my memory as something unresolved.

Hence the metafilter question.

===

Thank you to all that answered. I know now that I did the right thing. Meaning something that didn't make me look insane or vengeful.
posted by spec80 at 3:19 PM on October 5, 2006