phoebe ayers wrote:
wikimania2006.org is not taken last I checked. CHI seems to be doing quite well using that model. I didn't find Wikimania registered as a trademark with the US, European, Australian or Canadian patent offices at least. Don't know about doing a more comprehensive international search...
Yeah... but would people know to look for wikimania2006.org over wikimania.org? I say we secure the trademark, and try to discuss with the domain owners over who has a right to get the website, or how much it would cost.
Does anyone know if they want to sell? What they want to sell for?
Getting a trademark (in the US) is a big pain and time-consuming (& pricy), but could probably be done since the conference likely had prior precendent over any other use. It could probably *not* be done before we actually need the site & name for publicity & such. IANAL, etc.
I did find Anthere's original statement to be cryptic and uninformative. I'm sure some of us would appreciate hearing a little more factual background to this story. The time and expense of getting a trademark will be there with any name.
Another unrelated question: I still don't see why it would be such a big deal to have both WikiSym and WikiSem, as they sound like they're related, but are unlikely to be confused. It would show more integration, which it seems WikiMedia projects as a whole lack. While I realize that WikiSym isn't connected to WikiMedia (or is it?) I think there would be little confusion, and the name sounds both professional-- seminar is a good conference word that doesn't sound too geeky or beer-drinky [avoiding the pitfalls of "convention" and "meetup", respectively]--and casual, with the second word
To my mind, this shindig is much broader than a seminar -- I typically think of a seminar as a narrowly focussed educational gathering. WikiWhatever2006 may be educational, but it also seems like it will be pretty all-encompassing...
Seriously! "WikiWhatever" is not such a bad idea. It has a certain soupçon of passive teenage defiance, without being boldly rebellious. As an encyclopedia Wikipedia pretty well deals with "whatever". It also reflects that sincerest form of humour that comes about from being able to laugh at oneself. "La Poste" in France, and "Die Bahn" are certainly good examples of generics being used to project something bigger. One time musical groups "The Band" and "The Who" did quite well with those names.
Anyway, to my ear Wikisym & Wikisem sound exactly the same. Dunno about other pronunciations.
I suspect that whether or not there is a difference is a matter of dialect. If they sound identical to you, then they probably do to others as well.
Ec