Date: Fri, 10 Sep 1999 21:01:37 +0000 (GMT) From: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> To: jlemon@americantv.com (Jonathan Lemon) Cc: brett@lariat.org, chat@FreeBSD.ORG, jkh@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Market share and platform support Message-ID: <199909102101.OAA17075@usr09.primenet.com> In-Reply-To: <19990910141053.25557@right.PCS> from "Jonathan Lemon" at Sep 10, 99 02:10:53 pm
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> > Maybe, maybe not. Who owns the FreeBSD trademark? Do I need permission to > > use it? If so, can Walnut Creek influence whether or not I can use it? > > Ah, now this is a different kettle of fish. FreeBSD, Inc. probably owns > the mark, and they get to choose who they license it to. Additionally, > (I may be wrong here) I seem to recall that BSDi owns the "BSD" mark, > and the 3 BSD's (open/free/net) have a special dispensation from BSDI > to use it. This is actually legally contestable, if it ever became an issue. I urged (successfully) Bill Jolitz register "386BSD" as a trademark, and it was granted by the USPTO (I believe prior to the BSDI application for "BSD"). Even so, one could argue "common usage" on "BSD" alone, if one had to, since there is a long history of apriori usage. Acronyms can be trademarked (e.g. "IBM"), but they must be acted upon before falling into common usage. This is tantamount to Microsoft having attempted to trademark the word "Windows" by itself, or Coca-Cola attempting to trademark "Cola" as an anticompetitive practice aime at Pepsi Co.: the term is in common use. > So, while the code may be free, the mark is not. This may definitely > pose a problem, as to whether you are permitted to take the existing > code base, make massive changes, and still call it ``FreeBSD-Foo''. And this is a real problem, if one wants to avoid the appearance of a FreeBSD schism over a mere issue of packaging and distribution. The work "FreeBSD" is, in fact, a registered trademark, and is not subject to the same "common usage" arguments as "BSD". > If you want to attack a new segment, you can introduce a new product, > (say FreeBSD-Desktop), and position this as the desktop solution. Or > you can create a new brand (FreeLinux, based on the world-class FreeBSD > server operating system, with the friendliness of Linux!), and position > this brand at a new segment without fear that it will "pollute" the image > of an existing brand. Lest we forget: What was called "FreeBSD 1.0" was renamed from "FreeBSD 0.1" at the request of Walnut Creek CDROM, for marketing reasons. The release of something called "FreeBSD 0.1" at all was the result of a revocation of right to use the "386BSD" trademark. "FreeBSD" exists because Bill Jolitz refused the use of the trademark when he renigged on a previous agreement that the code which was to later become "FreeBSD" would be permitted to be released as "386BSD 0.5", an interim release between "386BSD 0.1", released by Jolitz, and the greatly delayed "386BSD 1.0", which was also to be released by Jolitz. Trademarks are the levers by which schism is wrought. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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