Re: [gentoo-nfp] Gentoo Trademark License (name/logo usage)

[Alec Warner]

On Sat, Dec 21, 2013 at 12:57 PM, Rich Freeman <rich0@g.o> wrote:

> On Sat, Dec 21, 2013 at 3:42 PM, Matthew Summers
> <quantumsummers@g.o> wrote:
> > Our trademark registration for both the wordmark "GENTOO" and our "G"
> > Logo are perpetual (as of last year's filing) and cover national (USA)
> > and applicable international usage (i.e. with countries we have
> > treaties with governing this sort of thing). I am not aware of what
> > Friends of Gentoo eV has in the way of a trademark. However based on
> > the statements of our representative (Fenwick & West) to the USPTO, I
> > was led to believe that the Gentoo Foundation Inc is the sole owner of
> > the aforementioned marks.
> >
> > If there is a need I can contact our rep for clarification.
>
> My understanding is that US courts don't really recognize the
> jurisdiction of any other courts.  If some company that generally does
> business outside the US happens to have any property at all in the US
> or a country the US has a lot of influence over and they harm the
> Gentoo mark, legally we could probably do bad things to them.  The
> reach of the US isn't infinite, of course, but it goes pretty far.
> I'm not commenting at all as to whether we should do such things, or
> whether US courts should be the way they are - I'm speaking mainly to
> our options.
>

I would exercise caution in speculating on what options are available to us
(nominally that is the job of counsel.)


>
> I guess my point is that in the US trademarks are very well-protected.
>  Hence we should be careful about implying that our mark is weaker
> than it actually is, because that will actually make it weaker.  My
> understanding is that as far as any US court is concerned there is
> only one Gentoo on the entire planet and it is the Gentoo Foundation,
> unless we actually limit ourselves.
>

So I agree in principal here.


>
> All that said, it would probably make sense at some point to try to
> combine with the e.V. or at least come to some kind of agreement on
> scope for the two organizations.  As far as I'm aware the Gentoo
> Foundation is the only one footing the day-to-day bills and if I had
> to guess I'd say the majority of our funding for conferences/etc goes
> to Europe as well.  I'm sure the e.V. does great things too.
>

I'm unsure what legal agreements (if any) the Gentoo Foundation currently
has with Gentoo e.V.

I refuse to let this speculation continue though. If you don't know what
Gentoo e.V is doing,
I recommend not speculating further on the list and simply engage them in
conversation about it. They are nice folks ;)

They have a website: https://www.gentoo-ev.org/
Here are their trademark guidelines: https://www.gentoo-ev.org/wiki/Marke

I'm not sure what their budget is, or what they spend their money on. I
know they sell stuff at conferences (T-shirts, mugs, pins, etc.)

-A



> Rich
>
>