[Wikimedia-l] Community consultation on trademark practices and Community logo

[Yana Welinder]

Hi all,

For the benefit of community members that are not on this list and given
some earlier email problems, we have posted our email directly on the
consultation talk page:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Logo/Request_for_consultation#September_26th_Wikimedia-l_email_from_Geoff_and_Yana

Please join this community consultation here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Logo/Request_for_consultation.

Many thanks for your input,

Geoff & Yana

---

Original email:

Hi all,

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has
constructively participated in the ongoing trademark practices consultation
that we started several months ago.  Please feel free to continue your
participation there, since all issues continue to remain open for
discussion.[1]  We would also like to invite community members to join the
ongoing discussion regarding the trademark protection of the Community logo
that we posted on Monday:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Logo/Request_for_consultation.
 Our goal is to obtain clear direction from the community on how we should
proceed with respect to the registration of the Community logo and whether
we should pursue a collective membership mark for the community.

Our current consultation is part of an ongoing discussion regarding this
logo. We joined this discussion on the talk page for the Community logo and
Wikimedia thematic organizations.[2]  We then initiated a broader
discussion on trademarks in June, where the discussion on the Community
logo continued.[1] That trademark practice discussion remains open and
active, and we have been responding to a wide array of important issues
thanks to community comments.

We were first notified this weekend of a potential opposition to the
trademark registration,[3]  an issue not raised earlier in the community
consultation on trademark practices even though the deadline for the
opposition was not until December 22.  We accordingly initiated a community
consultation on Monday about how you would like us to handle this.[4]
Indeed, this is consistent with the legal team’s ongoing efforts over the
last two years to include the community in important legal decisions and
policy proposals. We have put a strong emphasis on a close working
relationship with the community, such as in our discussions on the Terms of
Use, the Privacy Policy, the Conflict of Interest Guidelines, the Legal
Fees Assistance Program, the Political Affiliation Policy, and now the
Trademark Policy.[5]

In our ongoing consultation regarding the Community logo, we have asked the
community to let us know whether to seek a collective membership mark
(which will help maintain protection against misuse by others, while
allowing free use by community members) or to abandon the registration of
the trademark and its protection by WMF.[4]  Collective membership mark is
an idea that we started researching a couple of months ago in light of
community comments in the trademarks discussion and had planned to present
it after finishing the research.

To be clear, we have no emotional investment in the outcome. This
consultation is the community's opportunity to let us know how the mark
should or should not be protected. As we stated before, we are fine
abandoning the trademark registration to put our limited resources against
other priorities, but this decision belongs to you and the Board [6]. To
ensure full community participation, we have invited users from all across
the world to take part in this and continue to encourage that.[4]

Our actions will be based on the community consultation underway and the
Board, not on an extra-community legal action.  We understand that an
opposition against the Community logo trademark has been filed, and we will
handle it as we do all litigation.  The litigation deadlines are a
non-issue to us because we will do what the community and Board tell us.
 Our goal is to determine the broader community intent through a community
consultation that is open to everyone. If the community and Board tell us
that we should abandon registration, we will do so; if you want it
protected, let us know.

Please join in at
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Logo/Request_for_consultation and
tell us what you would like us to do.  Also please feel free to participate
in the more comprehensive discussion with the community on trademark
practices here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Trademark_practices_discussion

Thanks for your thoughts on this,

Geoff & Yana

[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Trademark_practices_discussion(trademark
statement)
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Trademark_practices_discussion(trademark
discussion)
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Logo and
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimedia_thematic_organizations#Is_it_correct_that_this_is_a_community_logo.3F

[3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3ACommunity_Logo%2FReclaim_the_Logo&diff=5823947&oldid=5823876
[4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Logo/Request_for_consultation
[5] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Terms_of_use,
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Privacy_policy,
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Guidelines_on_potential_conflicts_of_interest,
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Legal_Fees_Assistance_Program,
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Foundation_Policy_and_Political_Association_Guideline
[6] Board approval is probably necessary since we registered the logo in
light of a Board resolution.  After the Community logo was adopted as the
official Meta logo, it was added to the list of Wikimedia logos in
September 2008. In April 2009, the Board of Trustees adopted a resolution
directing WMF staff “to register and protect the Wikimedia marks” (
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution:Trademark_statement ).  The
Board can provide clarification that we should or should not register the
Community mark based on the results of the community consultation.