Registering Open Source Names and Logos - A Poll - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 01:20:33 am
content: When starting a new Open Source Project should you trademark the name?Registering a trademark is very expensive. If not registered you face a risk of losing the trademark rights to a malicious parasite.What should you do?Linus Torwalds ran into a lot of problems when a random person registered the name Linux. To prevent the name from being stolen Torwalds had to take the matter to court resulting in a great deal of expense and grief. The matter ended with an undisclosed court settlement which litigated the name Linux to Linus Torwalds. As a result Torwalds became the owner of the Linux trademark. According to most jurisdictions a trademark has to be used in trade in order to be valid. If a trademark is not "used in trade" it may be declared abandoned and lost as a result.It is the fallacy of the law that everything is subject to trade. Not everything is subject to trade and a value of a thing is not necessary the value "in trade". This is my main criticism towards law and capitalism in general.Torwalds had to give the burden of protecting and licensing the use of the trademark to the Linux Mark Institute. According to Jon 'maddog' Hall, the institute have spent 300.000 USD in law suits in order to protect the Linux trademark, most of the money coming from maddog's own pocket.On the other hand registering a trademark internationally by the Madrid convention rules starts from 10.000 Euros and rises to 100.000+ Euros if extended to cover all countries.Prior use in trade can* be used to build a case if the trademark is not properly registered. (* I'm not a lawyer. Don't quote me on that.) So neither way is an option for a startup.It seems like you need to be a lawyer in order to simply put a name on your project.Some interesting reading on the subject:Linus gets tough on Linux trademarkAsterix, the Gall - The Strange History of Linux and Trademarks

author: bullet308
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 02:03:58 am
content: I think that IF you think that preserving the integrity of a projects identity, THEN you should make every effort to secure the name/logo by way of copyright, trademark or design patent. IF you don't make any effort to protect the project's identity AND the trademark proves to be worth a significant amount of money, THEN somebody will claim it for themselves, as Linus found out the hard way. Even if you cant afford the full trademark process, some effort needs to be made to nail this matter down, if only to provide you with grounds later to challenge somebody else's hijacking of the name.I kinda' like how the Arduino folks hang onto the word "Arduino" but then we have this entire constellation of other -ino's as related projects. This preserves a core identity for the baseline boards, software, T-shirts, whatever, for the core developers but allows the rest of the Arduino ecosphere an opportunity to join in.

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 09:42:44 am
content: The catch is that you need a lot of money to register properly. If you don't you spend even more money in the long run.

author: Jimmy
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 09:57:24 am
content: I know there is some scum out there like the deal with the Amy Winehouse Foundation problem but does it really mater what the name of something is. You would be better off registering the domain before the project is released. Years ago Dick Smith Electronics wanted to start a webpage but someone had squatted his name and many variances of it so they just named it DSE.

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 10:28:03 am
content: Quote from: Jimmy on September 09, 2011, 09:57:24 amChanged the poll to reflect that. I believe you can remove your vote and cast it again.Thanks.

author: bullet308
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 02:33:10 pm
content: I suppose the question is, just how many *cheap* ways can you stake a claim to a name, logo, etc? The domain name is perhaps the most obvious and inexpensive one. Creating a stylised logo and asserting a copyright for it (in the US, you just have to say its copyrighted for it to be so) would qualify as well.

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 04:36:30 pm
content: I am not a lawyer, and laws vary around the world. If I understand the local law here right, then prominently using a particular name or logo for some time in business can give you rights to that name or logo, without the need to register. However, having registered makes it easier in court to argue you have a right to the name or logo.However, does it matter?How many open source projects get so big that they become interesting targets? Not many. How likely is it that your particular project becomes big?Open source projects renaming themselves are not unusual. Sometimes for legal reasons. I am not aware of an open source project that killed itself just because they renamed. It might be a factor in some project death if they did stupid things in addition.Some big projects I am aware of that renamed are:Mambo -> JomalaHudson -> JenkinsNetscape -> FirefoxOpenOffice -> LibreOfficeAll these are big projects. Most of them did the renaming as part of a fork, but the kind of fork where all key developers went with the fork. So the new project is in fact the legit successor of the old one. And the old one mostly an empty hull now.Their users went with them (the verdict in the OpenOffice - LibreOffice case is not yet completely in, but it looks good for LibreOffice).I think the more important consideration when choosing a project name is to make sure that name is not trademarked or widely used by someone else.

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 07:30:32 pm
content: Quote from: BoredAtWork on September 09, 2011, 04:36:30 pmYou are quite right, prior use of a mark can be used to build a case. However this works only after you go to court. This was exactly what Linus did, unfortunately it was not enough to prevent problems. In his case the person who registered the name did not claim rights immediately. He waited for a year and then asked for 25% royalty for past usage not only from Linus but from companies like Red Hat and SuSE who also used the name Linux.The second link in the OP explains very well what happened under the paragraph "All your Linuxes are belong to me".It was not possible for Linus to simply change the name because the parasite wanted money for past usage. At the end Linus won the case and got the name back but he still had to pay a serious sum for lawyers. So we can't say it does not matter, it matters a great deal.Changing the name is also not without problems. In software you simply distribute a new version with the new name and kindly ask your user base to upgrade. How do you do it in hardware? You can't kindly ask your users who paid hard cash to throw away their hardware and buy exactly the same hardware with a different name.One thing is clear to me, the laws are unjust in the sense that they protect only what is subject to trade but can not protect anything from becoming a subject of trade. For example you can register the word "windows" as a subject of trade but you can't do anything to protect the word "baby" from ever becoming subject of trade.

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2011, 08:37:14 pm
content: Once again, how likely is it that your project becomes so big that there is a chance it attacks scum? You can mull that Linux example all day long. Unless you are about to deliver the next Linux it is mood.If you still think registration is necessary before you start, fine, go for it. If you can't afford registration find a sponsor or refrain from the project.Further, there is no difference with having to change the name of a hardware or software project. Just releasing software under another name doesn't mean every user of the software under the old name will uninstall the old.