Re: Please READ -> GNOME Logo Usage

[Marc Ewing <marc redhat com>]

Andreas Kostyrka <andreas@ag.or.at> writes:
> On Thu, 30 Jul 1998, Havoc Pennington wrote:
> 
> > 
> > On Thu, 30 Jul 1998, Michael Fulbright wrote:
> > > 
> > > I wonder if someone/something needs to trademark the logo winner to
> > > protect it. Anyone know? 
> > > 
> > 
> > Sure, how are you going to have a protected trademark unless someone owns
> > the trademark? You have to send out threatening letters every time it's
> > used without permission. ;-) Seriously you should email Bruce Perens
> > (bruce@pixar.com) he researched all this for the Debian logo. More
> > seriously a lawyer should probably be consulted.
> Perhaps the Redhat lawyer could consult upon this. As to wheter Redhat
> should own the Trademark, I'm not that sure. Me personally, I trust Redhat
> enough, but it would probably sound bad to the general public. (That is
> already crying that Gnome is a Redhat only thing, that Redhat already has
> to much control, etc.) Perhaps the FSF could get the trademark rights.

There isn't much of a question: if we want the GNOME logo to have the
full legal protection possible, it should be trademarked.  It's a simple
(though long and somewhat costly) process to register in the US.  I think
the question of ownership of the mark can be decided after we determine
that we really need to go through the hoops of registration (personally,
I'd be happy with Red Hat, Bruce Peren's SPI, Linux International, Miguel,
etc).

I'm of the opinion that a free software project does not necessarily
need registered trademark protection.  There are simple things we can
do now to lay the groundwork for protecting the mark, should it ever
become necessary to do so:

1) Place a small "TM" after the first use of the mark on any "page"
2) Include the "GNOME" logotype below the foot wherever possible
3) Do not distort of modify the mark in any way

> Additionally, there should be strict guidelines when the trademark can be
> used. (Is a commercial fully-Gnome-compliant program entitled?)

That is up to the owner of the trademark.  They can allow/disallow use
under any conditions they like (pretty much).

-Marc