Comments on: Mini Quiz

By: Shawn Kearney

Shawn Kearney — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 03:34:42 +0000

I think that there is a great risk that people think "open source" means "total and complete public domain" on every single aspect surrounding the GPL'd property. I can understand Ton's POV on this, and I despise overzelous copyright control (ahem, wedding photographers). But, at the same time there is a time and place for enforcement, this might not be such, but, I think that the Foundation should keep a careful eye on misguided appropriations.

By: Witchfinder General

Witchfinder General — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 14:32:13 +0000

moot – adjective – subject to debate or uncertainty: a moot point.

By: Guardian 452

Guardian 452 — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 03:39:35 +0000

The state of the trademark/copyright actually alleviates any concern I might have had…Ton, thank you for responding!

I wasn't worried that the Blender logo had been stolen. My concern arose from the fact that the planet positive site made a point of saying that corporations that met their criteria could put their logo up. Simply put, it seems they're looking to get their logo seen out there.

That being the case, there's always the chance someone will see the Blender logo and think it was stolen…that's what worried me.

Still, now that I've read Ton's responses, I think the whole point is moot.

By: roofoo

roofoo — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 19:23:05 +0000

Anybody can put a TM next to their logo. That doesn't make it exclusively theirs. It's only a registered trademark with an (R) next to it, that is registered with the US Patent and Trademark Office that is enforceable.

By: ton

ton — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 19:15:51 +0000

darf: Well that's history…
http://www.blender.org/blenderorg/blender-foundation/history/
BF got – as only licensee – the rights to use trademark/logo and brand.

By: darf

darf — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:59:28 +0000

Why is the trademark and logo of Blender still owned by NaN?

By: ton

ton — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:35:42 +0000

Blender's logo is copyrighted, and Blender Foundation will only allow websites or magazines to use it to point to Blender as product or to link to the website. Full usage instructions I should put on the website once!
The logo is certainly not 'free' or CC. That would make it as brand not having much value anymore…

As for this case: it's strikingly similar, but I don't see any reason to act… they made an own version, and it might well be a coincidence. I've even once started collected similar logos, the "hand with eye" concept is quite used a lot. Examples are "Second Life" and "Opened Hand". :)

As for people interested in history; Joeri once made a nice website for it:
http://mopi.nl/blogo/index.html

By: vidrazor

vidrazor — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:18:30 +0000

Never mind what WE think, has Ton and company been notified? There may be a need to take some legal action to keep things Kosher.

By: Phunamy

Phunamy — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:13:10 +0000

Even if the Blender logo were trademarked, there would still be a lawsuit, and one would have to prove who had it first. Even though there is clear evidence of a difference, there is a similarity clause. Just take the Lindows/Window case, Microsoft sued and won. Now there is no Lindows.

By: Gryphon

Gryphon — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:00:07 +0000

I think it's a little sad that so few people have been willing to consider the possibility that it's a coincidence. I imagine fewer of us are as infuriated as our posts come across, but still. Maybe it wasn't a malicious attack by the Planet-Positive folks?

I can't help noticing that both Ton and Bart have kept totally silent on this. I can just imagine them having a beer and laughing at all the funny BlenderNation comments about what may well be a total non-issue.

And Bart, that's not to put words in your mouth. If I'm misinterpreting, I apologize. It just seems like, if this were as important as we're making it sound, something would have been done by now.