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Trademark Insanity
,----[ Quote ]
| It's bad enough that we have to deal with struggles over the use of
| trademarks that have become generic terms, like "Xerox" and "Coke", and
| trademarks that were already generic terms among specialists, such
| as "Windows", but a new low in trademarking has been reached by the joint
| efforts of Dell and the US Patent and Trademark Office. Cyndy Aleo-Carreira
| reports that Dell has applied for a trademark on the term "cloud computing".
| The opposition period has already passed and a notice of allowance has been
| issued. That means that it is very likely that the application will soon
| receive final approval.
|
| [...]
|
| In other words, this is a pure example of theft from the public domain.
| Speakers of English have a term, "cloud computing", which the US government
| is on the verge of privatizing and assigning exclusively to Dell. Other
| companies providing similar services will not be able to describe what they
| are doing as "cloud computing" anymore than Nike will be able to describe its
| shoes as Reeboks.
`----
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=434
It's not just the patent system that's becoming a joke. The politicians are too
easily corruptible.
Recent:
Software Freedom: More Than Copyright
,----[ Quote ]
| What would be in these two new definitions? Both would need to define what
| promotes software freedom and how it can be protected. Both would need to be
| pragmatically principled.
|
| * An Open Source Patent Definition would do for patents what the OS(C)D
| does for copyrights. I've posted a lot on this subject before, notably in
| Protecting Developers from Patents and Ten Reasons The World Needs Patent
| Covenants, so I'd go mining there for my contributions to the discussion.
| But it may also be that in addition there needs to be a call for patent
| law reform, maybe as I outlined in Seven Patent Reforms While We Wait For
| Nirvana.
| * When it comes to an Open Source Trademark Definition, we would need to
| similarly define the signs that a developer or user needs to know whether
| software freedom is being promoted in a trademark policy. I've not
| written about this yet, but I do believe we need to collectively
| understand the bounds trademark law places on people who have
| responsibility for trademarks (read: all developers and open source
| communities as well as all vendors). We then need to construct a path
| that promotes software freedom without placing impossible demands on
| trademark owners to behave in ways that are contrary to their
| responsibilities.
|
| This is not easy stuff. But I do believe that certain recent events between
| the open and proprietary software worlds mean that it's time for software
| freedom fighters to get together and work on these things. I'm ready to work
| on it. What do you say, Michael?
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http://blogs.sun.com/webmink/entry/answering_michael
Guest Commentary: Second Life Artists Rightfully Upset Over “SLART” Trademark
Registration
,----[ Quote ]
| A Bitter Dessert — Conclusions
|
| In the end, this is a bad situation for people in the Second Life art
| community. Although the SLART trademark probably shouldn’t have been
| registered in the first place, it has been, and now people are faced with a
| choice of either losing the use of the word, or opening themselves up to
| potential lawsuits and account suspensions.
`----
http://virtuallyblind.com/2008/01/25/slart-trademark/
Smartphones Patented... Just About Everyone Sued 1 Minute After Patent Issued
,----[ Quote ]
| This past Tuesday, the US Patent and Trademark Office issued a patent on "a
| mobile entertainment and communication device." Reading the patent, you
| realize it describes the quite common smartphone. It's a patent for a mobile
| phone with removable storage, an internet connection, a camera and the
| ability to download audio or video files.
`----
http://techdirt.com/articles/20080124/16382062.shtml
Related:
Orange launches 'Open Office'
,----[ Quote ]
| The only reason that those behind the software suite do not use the
| name "Open Office" is the registration of that trademark in the Netherlands
| by an Ubuntu Linux-affiliated company. The co-founder of the Linux company,
| Wouter Hanegraaff, told ZDNet.co.uk that his company still occasionally falls
| foul of confusion generated by OpenOffice.org's internationally implemented
| nomenclature, but he wished Orange well with their UK-based venture.
`----
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/communications/0,1000000085,39289058,00.htm?r=4
Ubuntu Lays Down the Trademark Law
,----[ Quote ]
| Mark Shuttleworth, CEO of Canonical Ltd., the company behind Ubuntu,
| announced the trademark policy in his blog on April 25.
`----
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,2123267,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03129TX1K0000616
Perhaps Microsoft will sue Red Hat for trademark infringement (vs. copyright
or patent)
,----[ Quote ]
| That could be in the case. Especially since Novell, in its watershed
| deal with Microsoft, has taken great care to reiterate that it still
| believes that it has not infringed on any Microsoft patents. Why then
| would Novell pay such a huge sum of money (with a promise of longer-term
| royalities) if it really believed this? Answer? Microsoft may have
| presented Novell with compelling evidence that Linux (or something that
| Novell was distributing) infringes on its copyright. Or maybe a trademark
| (or a servicemark).
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http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=3986
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