[ogb-discuss] Sun's Responses to the OpenSolaris Trademark Questions

[Brandorr]

I would like to thank Sun and the OGB for working to get this clarified.
This is not the result I had hoped for.

My understanding and hopes were that all of our current and future distros
would be consumers of the great technologies developed here at
opensolaris.org, and that Sun would leverage their Solaris trademark for
commercial products. Being that Sun has made up their to use their trademark
for a distro, I ask the OGB to consider asking Sun to move Indiana work to
opensolaris.com, and leave opensolaris.org as an inclusionary community for
all the distros.  OpenSolaris.com would host the Indiana branch of code,
it's development and website, and the community they are building.

Thanks,
Brian

On Feb 11, 2008 11:25 PM, Rich Teer <rich.teer at rite-group.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> When the initial code drop of Project Indiana was released as the
> OpenSolaris Developer Preview last October, a lot of questions and
> concerns were raised around Sun's use of the OpenSolaris name for its
> distribution, and how it might affect community use of the OpenSolaris
> trademark.
>
> As the community's elected representatives, the OGB passed the community's
> questions and concerns to Sun's OGB liason, Bill Franklin.  We recently
> received Sun's response, and the board has authorised me to release it.
> Below is a verbatim copy of Sun's response; at this time the OGB neither
> endoreses nor opposes Sun's response.
>
> For and on behalf of the OGB,
>
> --
> Rich Teer, SCSA, SCNA, SCSECA, OGB member
>
> CEO,
> My Online Home Inventory
>
> URLs: http://www.rite-group.com/rich
>      http://www.linkedin.com/in/richteer
>      http://www.myonlinehomeinventory.com
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Fri, 08 Feb 2008 17:08:11 -0800
> From: William.Franklin at Sun.COM
> To: ogb-private at opensolaris.org
> Subject: [ogb-private] Sun's Responses to the Trademark
>
> Rich et al:
>
> In response to the OpenSolaris Governing Board (OGB) meeting in early
> November, and a number of other directed questions I, as the Sun
> Executive liaison to the OGB, have been asked to respond to those
> queries.  Here is Sun's statement.
>
> 1. International trademark law requires trademark owners to take certain
> specific actions to protect their brands, and the OpenSolaris trademark
> and brand is no different. The OpenSolaris trademark, as a mark derived
> from the Solaris trademark, belongs to Sun Microsystems Inc., and Sun
> must defend it or risk not only the OpenSolaris trademark, but the
> Solaris trademark as well.
>
> When Sun originally set up the OpenSolaris project and invited the
> community members to join it, it informally granted some uses of the
> OpenSolaris trademark to the community, such as the use of the name to
> identify the community. At that time Sun continued to reserve to itself
> the right to name any operating system distribution with the Solaris or
> OpenSolaris trademarks, and did not allow community members building
> their own distros to use those marks in their distro names.
>
> With the three years of experience since then, Sun has decided that it
> would be better for both the community and for its own business, if
> distros were allowed to use the OpenSolaris trademark so that they could
> form an ecosystem of compatible software package and services.
>
> To jumpstart this ecosystem, Sun has decided to fund Project Indiana to
> build a base distro, which it will name OpenSolaris, and to allow others
> to use the OpenSolaris trademark in approved ways in the name or
> marketing of their distros.
>
>
> 2. In support of this effort, Sun invites the OpenSolaris community to
> collaborate in the definition of a set of guidelines that will enable
> others to build derivative operating systems that are compatible with
> the goals of the OpenSolaris operating system and, as an expression of
> that compatibility, are eligible to use the OpenSolaris brand in clearly
> defined ways. Trademark law requires the mark owner to maintain
> objective quality control measures that apply to uses of the mark. Sun
> welcomes the input, expertise and influence of the OpenSolaris Community
> Groups in developing these measures. The work is already in progress at
>
> http://www.genunix.org/wiki/index.php/Trademark_usage_and_Branding_guideline
>
>
>
> 3. Legally, for the purposes of many nations' trademark laws, all other
> uses need to be reserved by Sun, but terms for use are negotiable.Sun's
> statement specifically left out bumper stickers, key chains, user groups
> and book titles. The original debate was about distributions,and Sun
> wished to clarify that naming position. Sun allows things like 'Solaris
> User Group', and 'Java User Group', and 'I Love Java (J2SE1.4)' Coffee
> mugs. Sun has a published fair use policy
> (http://www.sun.com/policies/trademarks/#rules) and Sun feels that this
> would work for the use of OpenSolaris in 98% of the cases. Sun certainly
> would love to see the next good computer thriller movie use OpenSolaris
> as the platform that the good guys use to protect the earth from
> impending galactic doom.
>
> Regards,
>
> William L. Franklin
> Vice President, Engineering
> Solaris Core Operating System
> Sun Microsystems
> _______________________________________________
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>



-- 
- Brian Gupta

http://opensolaris.org/os/project/nycosug/

http://www.genunix.org/wiki/index.php/OpenSolaris_New_User_FAQ
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