What type of agreement do I need to make sure I own my product's code and have full rights to amend and sell the business (incl. the code) later?

Disclaimer: I'm not an intellectual property attorney - and I am not attempting to, nor qualified to give legal advice. That said - here is what I know on the subject. Copyright was once explained to me as a bundle of sticks, where each stick was a different right. Two sticks that might be important in this situation would be: 1. Distribution Rights: Creating the sheet music in itself may be harmless, but copyright does cover right to distribute - and so your idea to distribute for profit may infringe upon this right. 2. Derivative Works: Copyright also gives the owner the right to create derivative works based on the original - so even if your version is different - it becomes an issue of "how different" - so you may also be infringing on this right. One path forward is to determine who owns these rights (the original artists or label often sell the rights) and license the right to produce and sell the sheet music. My guess is this could be cost and time prohibitive. Another would be to see who is already selling sheet music for these songs - and simply act as an affiliate, taking a portion of the revenues per sale. Consider trying the affiliate route first, to determine how many of these sales you generate from your audience, before going to the trouble of licensing the content etc. I'd be happy to discuss ways that you can validate demand within your population before you do either, and recommend doing so with or without my input. Cheers, Ryan

On paper you have the advantage but after several startups control resides in he who knows how to execute the vision of the company.

Your first point of reference should be experience. The most effective way to create your ToS is to consult with a lawyer who specializes in your industry. This also hold true for your that and any business legal document. It’s true that you can find different online services and templates to assist you, but the truth is that these documents could very well be null and void. Your business is specific and unique and your ToS should be the same way. I advise against copying your ToS or using one of the “easy to use” sites as they will almost certainly fail to include or capture everything. Read more: https://lawtrades.com/blog/protect-website-liability/ At www.lawtrades.com, we have plenty of experienced Terms of Service and Privacy policy lawyers who will complete it for you on-demand. I have seen PP and TOS prepared routinely for $599 or less, and these documents essentially serve as a “blueprint” for your business. (Full disclosure: I'm the founder/CEO). In my opinion, copying your competitors legal documents will not work for you in the long run. The odds are high that the business had their documents customized, and by copying and pasting you are claiming that your business has the same features and services which is highly unlikely. Hope this helped address some of your concerns. When you're ready, you make your request completely free at www.lawtrades.com to get a better feel for the process. Feel free to mention "clarity" for a discount :)

I developed and published mobile apps as an individual for several years, and only formed a corporation later as things grew and it made sense. As far as Apple's App Store and Google Play are concerned, you can register as an individual developer without having a corporation. I'd be happy to help further over a call if you have any additional questions. Best of luck with your mobile app!

I've discussed ideas with hundreds of startups, I've been involved in about a dozen startups, my business is at $1M+ revenue. The bad news is, there is no good way to protect ideas. The good news is, in the vast majority of cases you don't really need to. If you're talking to people about your idea, you could ask them to sign an NDA ("Non Disclosure Agreement"), but NDAs are notoriously hard to enforce, and a lot of experienced startup people wouldn't sign them. For example, if you asked me to sign an NDA before we discussed your Idea, I'd tell you "thanks, but no thanks". This is probably the right place though to give the FriendDA an honorable mention: http://friendda.org/. Generally, I'd like to encourage you to share your Ideas freely. Even though telling people an idea is not completely without risk, generally the rewards from open discussions greatly outweigh the risks. Most startups fail because they build something nobody wants. Talking to people early, especially people who are the intended users/customers for your idea can be a great way to protect yourself from that risk, which is considerably higher than the risk of someone taking off with your idea. Another general note, is that while ideas matter, I would generally advise you to get into startup for which you can generate a lot of value beyond the idea. One indicator for a good match between a founder and a startup is the answer to the question: "why is that founder uniquely positioned to execute the idea well". The best way to protect yourself from competition is to build a product that other people would have a hard time building, even if they had 'the idea'. These are usually startups which contain lots of hard challenges on the way from the idea to the business, and if you can convincingly explain why you can probably solve those challenges while others would have a hard time, you're on the right path. If you have any further questions, I'd be happy to set up a call. Good luck.