|> > I don't think the foundation owns the mediawiki logo. Copyright wise |> > it is in the public domain. |> Hoi, |> Given the age of the thing it cannot be PD yet. They are part of a |> trademark and as such they are owned by the Foundation. They can if they |> so choose license the logos. This is problematic because the rights that |> are usual for other WMF content contrasts with the requirement of |> maintaining the trademark. | |No, the MediaWiki one really is public domain. |http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:MediaWiki-smaller-logo.png | |Whether or not it is also a trademark of the Foundation doesn't affect |its copyright status. | |Angela.
Someone cannot declare a work PD just by copying it. It seems the actual logo was created by Eric Moller, and it has always been the understanding with all logos that they were "works made for hire" for the foundation. This has been discussed previously and Jimbo can back this up. Just because someone put a PD tag on the page at Commons does not invalidate the Foundation's claim to this logo.
As far as the "trademark" status of the logo, the word MEDIAWIKI is a registered mark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. I know this because I am the attorney of record on the USPTO file that granted this mark to the foundation. Also the actual logo is also a mark of the Wikimedia Foundation Inc., and is used to identify the MediaWiki software which is released by the Foundation and is a foundation project.
Of course all trademarks can also be used based upon principles of fair use that apply to trademarks in a similiar way as copyrights. The important issue is that the mark is not used in a way to confuse the public or dilute the brand which the mark represents as this is the kind of protection that the law affords mark holders.
Alex T Roshuk Attorney at law
On 11/16/06, ATR alex756@nyc.rr.com wrote:
Someone cannot declare a work PD just by copying it.
the authors however probably can although I am aware there is some disspute on that point..
It seems the actual logo was created by Eric Moller, and it has always been the understanding with all logos that they were "works made for hire" for the foundation. This has been discussed previously and Jimbo can back this up. Just because someone put a PD tag on the page at Commons does not invalidate the Foundation's claim to this logo.
That someone was the author:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Image:MediaWiki-smaller-logo....
While the work for hire bit holds true for most of the more recent logos it doesn't so much for things tha happened in the early days
ATR wrote:
|> > I don't think the foundation owns the mediawiki logo. Copyright wise |> > it is in the public domain. |> Hoi, |> Given the age of the thing it cannot be PD yet. They are part of a |> trademark and as such they are owned by the Foundation. They can if they |> so choose license the logos. This is problematic because the rights that |> are usual for other WMF content contrasts with the requirement of |> maintaining the trademark. | |No, the MediaWiki one really is public domain. |http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:MediaWiki-smaller-logo.png | |Whether or not it is also a trademark of the Foundation doesn't affect |its copyright status. | |Angela.
Someone cannot declare a work PD just by copying it. It seems the actual logo was created by Eric Moller, and it has always been the understanding with all logos that they were "works made for hire" for the foundation. This has been discussed previously and Jimbo can back this up. Just because someone put a PD tag on the page at Commons does not invalidate the Foundation's claim to this logo.
As far as the "trademark" status of the logo, the word MEDIAWIKI is a registered mark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. I know this because I am the attorney of record on the USPTO file that granted this mark to the foundation. Also the actual logo is also a mark of the Wikimedia Foundation Inc., and is used to identify the MediaWiki software which is released by the Foundation and is a foundation project.
Of course all trademarks can also be used based upon principles of fair use that apply to trademarks in a similiar way as copyrights. The important issue is that the mark is not used in a way to confuse the public or dilute the brand which the mark represents as this is the kind of protection that the law affords mark holders.
Alex T Roshuk Attorney at law
Can I put my feet in the mud here ?
The logo was a creation of Erik. The flower is from me (see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tournesol%28L%29.jpg)
After the end of the contest, Erik decided to use that logo for mediawiki. At this time, it was not clear at all the logos would be trademarked by the Foundation. The truth is we had no idea at that time how important trademarks would be in the future. Well, the Foundation was created only a couple of months before the international contest for logos. There was no set up board. There were no board decision. There were no resolution. In short, there is absolutely no trackable way to prove there was an understanding the Foundation would own the trademark. This is just bullshit. There was no clear understanding. We were young, we did not know. Period.
My memory is also very clear that developers did not want the mediawiki logo and name to be owned by the Foundation. Of course, in real life, anyone can claim to own a trademark on something that nobody else claim. So, the Foundation asked to own the trademark of this, and now does. And with most developers now making a living thanks to the Foundation, I doubt very much any of them would ever make a complain over this. There is now a history.
Several months after the logo started being used for mediawiki, Erik asked me if I would put the flower image under public domain. Again, I did not know much about copyright and author rights at that time. At this point, the image was under GFDL, which made no sense for a logo, and no sense for what we wanted it to be used for. It may be that another licence would have been better.
The mediawiki software is very arguably a Foundation project as you claim. For a long time, it was not. And the developers did not want it to be. It seems the Foundation just decided at some point that it was. Apparently. The problem I have with this statement, is that I far as I know, I have been on the board of trustees since june 2004, and I have NO memory we ever decided that mediawiki was a wikimedia project. For all I know, it is not. And for now, the Foundation website does not claim it is : http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Our_projects.
It is definitly a software we are using. Developers are largely improving it for our projects. But others are improving it as well. The main *ownership* of mediawiki is related to the main developers being now paid by the Foundation. It may be a wikimedia project in this that we largely support its development. But it is not officially a wikimedia project. Period.
Now, understand it well. I *prefer* that the Foundation owns the logo and name trademarks, because as you say, it means the logo and name can not be misused to confuse public.
However, contrariwise to Wikipedia, the mediawiki software is not only used by the Foundation, but by also thousands of projects around the world. The worse thing that could happen is that people deciding to use the mediawiki find themselves obliged to ask permission or even worse to pay the Foundation to use the software, use the name, use the little logo, powered by Mediawiki. If something like this ever occurs in the future, I hope developers will consider changing the name, changing the logo and make it possible for the software to spread freely. This is what is important, and as long as the Foundation respects this spirit, and only defend the logo and name against bad uses, I am fine with the current situation.
In the end, I am only pissed of to see claims about what the Foundation owns, said, agreed to, blahblahblah, provided with the stamp "Jimbo can back this up". The Foundation is governed by a board. And as Angela will probably agree to, there are some decisions which were never made by the board. Which makes their validity questionnable.
Ant
The fact of the matter was that Jimbo applied for the MediaWiki trademark and then I fixed the application afterwards. The term "MEDIAWIKI" is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. This was done after the foundation was created, not before. This was not hidden from anyone it is a matter of public record:
http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?regser=serial&entry=78507335
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=6lvb7s.3.1
As you can see from the database TESS record it clearly states that the trademark was: "FIRST USE: 20030808. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20030809" The foundation was incorporated on June 20, 2003, August 8-9, 2003 is subsequent to that date. Thus, this is after the Foundation was created, not before. It was first posted on Wikimedia project web pages and it was proposed to be used in that context, no other. The logo was not create before that date, but afterwards. How can you say you own something when a part of it belongs to someone else?
Also Brion was aware of the trademark application and knows that the trademark has been registered by the foundation: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/htdig/foundation-l/2005-November/004774.ht... |"5) The Foundation may own the trademark on the name MediaWiki, which |postdates the creation of the software itself. | |6) A trademark registration for the mark was filed last year on behalf |of the foundation, though it hasn't totally gone through yet. (I'm not |the person to ask for details on that.) | |-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)"
Brion acknowledges that the foundation was getting a registration for the trademark, he or other developers never opposed this registration. They probably would find it very difficult to overturn that registratino now if they tried.
There is also a discussion about the creation & licensing of WMF trademarks and ownership by the foundation. I have not been able to find it, but when I do I will post it; this was the allusion I made to Jimbo being able to back up the fact that the Foundation expected people to grant the ownership of any logos to the foundation and not release them through some other license (why else would you create a logo for a brand, it makes no sense otherwise?)
The fact of a logo being made up of PD images, does not mean that someone can cannot recognize that MEDIAWIKI links back to WMF. It is up to the foundation to police that. If any people think they own it they can hire lawyers and bring the appropriate legal action to get the trademark invalided and then the foundation can either fight that or give it up. That seems really silly to me because the foundation is not making money out of this, (any suggestion is ridiculous because it is released under the GPL which allows free copying and alteration). This is just there to try and prevent people from stripping off the information about the contributors to the project, there is really not much else that the foundation can do because the software is released under the GPL anyway. It just keeps the WMF flavor of MediaWiki distinct from all others. Is that really something anyone needs to fight about or that we want to deny because individuals want everything in the public domain and do not care about the moral rights of authors, such as the right of attribution (which is still rightfully protected by most so called "copyleft" licenses because it is not an economic right but a right normally considered part of the "droit d'auteur" bundle of rights associated with intellectual work that countries like France and Canada recognize as being as important or even more important than the economic rights (unfortunately the USA has very limited moral rights protections for creators).
As far as the ownership of these things are concerned, if you do not have the right to release something into the public domain because it does not belong to you then you cannot later release it into the public domain as an afterthought and I would suggest that creating a logo that uses the trademarked term MediaWiki cannot be copyrighted by anyone other than the foundationno matter what the other people say, even if it is made up of a composite of public domain images (which do not have the licensing limitations of the GFDL or CC licenses).
The only record of owning the trademark MEDIAWIKI is with the WMF, anyone else using it is a trademark infringement. Does it matter who owns the copyright or even if it is copyrightable because it may just be so generic as not to be subject to copyright, i.e. the brackets and the sunflower show no inherent creativity as elements, they are just standard symbols. This reminds me of the dispute with that Neo-Nazi group that tried to claim it owned copyright in some symbol that was clearly not subject to copyright: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Arrow_Cross but of course the consensus on this issue seemed to be that they actually owned the copyright and the images were taken off Wikipedia because no one really seemed to want to fight these fascists.
We should be congnizant of the need to only fight battles that are important, not every fact dispute that exists because the reality is that there are a lot of these disputes and the resources to fight them are limited.
There is clearly a policy about Wikimedia logos being an exception to the content on Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Licensing "Use by Wikimedia only (the only non-free-licensed exceptions hosted here as well are Wikimedia logos and other designs copyrighted by the Wikimedia Foundation that are the trademarks, service marks or other design elements that identify the sites of the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation)"
If the Foundation board thinks this is incorrect they should have their General Counsel correct it or put people on Notice that anyone can use these logos for anything they want because they are on Commons and thus, according to the logic of some Wikipedians, must be released under the GFDL (even if they were never so released before being posted on Commons).
Alex T. Roshuk, Attorney
----- Original Message ----- From: "Anthere" Anthere9@yahoo.com To: foundation-l@wikimedia.org Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 12:25 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Foundation logo : pain and suffering
| ATR wrote: | > | > |> > I don't think the foundation owns the mediawiki logo. Copyright wise | > |> > it is in the public domain. | > |> Hoi, | > |> Given the age of the thing it cannot be PD yet. They are part of a | > |> trademark and as such they are owned by the Foundation. They can if they | > |> so choose license the logos. This is problematic because the rights that | > |> are usual for other WMF content contrasts with the requirement of | > |> maintaining the trademark. | > | | > |No, the MediaWiki one really is public domain. | > |http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:MediaWiki-smaller-logo.png | > | | > |Whether or not it is also a trademark of the Foundation doesn't affect | > |its copyright status. | > | | > |Angela. | > | > Someone cannot declare a work PD just by copying it. It seems the | > actual logo was created by Eric Moller, and it has always been the | > understanding with all logos that they were "works made for hire" for | > the foundation. This has been discussed previously and Jimbo can | > back this up. Just because someone put a PD tag on the page at | > Commons does not invalidate the Foundation's claim to this logo. | > | > As far as the "trademark" status of the logo, the word MEDIAWIKI is | > a registered mark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. I know this because | > I am the attorney of record on the USPTO file that granted this mark to | > the foundation. Also the actual logo is also a mark of the Wikimedia | > Foundation Inc., and is used to identify the MediaWiki software which | > is released by the Foundation and is a foundation project. | > | > Of course all trademarks can also be used based upon principles of | > fair use that apply to trademarks in a similiar way as copyrights. The | > important issue is that the mark is not used in a way to confuse the | > public or dilute the brand which the mark represents as this is the kind | > of protection that the law affords mark holders. | > | > Alex T Roshuk | > Attorney at law | | | Can I put my feet in the mud here ? | | The logo was a creation of Erik. The flower is from me (see here: | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tournesol%28L%29.jpg) | | After the end of the contest, Erik decided to use that logo for | mediawiki. At this time, it was not clear at all the logos would be | trademarked by the Foundation. The truth is we had no idea at that time | how important trademarks would be in the future. Well, the Foundation | was created only a couple of months before the international contest for | logos. There was no set up board. There were no board decision. There | were no resolution. In short, there is absolutely no trackable way to | prove there was an understanding the Foundation would own the trademark. | This is just bullshit. There was no clear understanding. We were young, | we did not know. Period. | | My memory is also very clear that developers did not want the mediawiki | logo and name to be owned by the Foundation. Of course, in real life, | anyone can claim to own a trademark on something that nobody else claim. | So, the Foundation asked to own the trademark of this, and now does. And | with most developers now making a living thanks to the Foundation, I | doubt very much any of them would ever make a complain over this. There | is now a history. | | Several months after the logo started being used for mediawiki, Erik | asked me if I would put the flower image under public domain. Again, I | did not know much about copyright and author rights at that time. At | this point, the image was under GFDL, which made no sense for a logo, | and no sense for what we wanted it to be used for. It may be that | another licence would have been better. | | The mediawiki software is very arguably a Foundation project as you | claim. For a long time, it was not. And the developers did not want it | to be. It seems the Foundation just decided at some point that it was. | Apparently. | The problem I have with this statement, is that I far as I know, I have | been on the board of trustees since june 2004, and I have NO memory we | ever decided that mediawiki was a wikimedia project. For all I know, it | is not. And for now, the Foundation website does not claim it is : | http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Our_projects. | | It is definitly a software we are using. Developers are largely | improving it for our projects. But others are improving it as well. The | main *ownership* of mediawiki is related to the main developers being | now paid by the Foundation. It may be a wikimedia project in this that | we largely support its development. But it is not officially a wikimedia | project. Period. | | Now, understand it well. I *prefer* that the Foundation owns the logo | and name trademarks, because as you say, it means the logo and name can | not be misused to confuse public. | | However, contrariwise to Wikipedia, the mediawiki software is not only | used by the Foundation, but by also thousands of projects around the | world. The worse thing that could happen is that people deciding to use | the mediawiki find themselves obliged to ask permission or even worse to | pay the Foundation to use the software, use the name, use the little | logo, powered by Mediawiki. If something like this ever occurs in the | future, I hope developers will consider changing the name, changing the | logo and make it possible for the software to spread freely. This is | what is important, and as long as the Foundation respects this spirit, | and only defend the logo and name against bad uses, I am fine with the | current situation. | | In the end, I am only pissed of to see claims about what the Foundation | owns, said, agreed to, blahblahblah, provided with the stamp "Jimbo can | back this up". The Foundation is governed by a board. And as Angela will | probably agree to, there are some decisions which were never made by the | board. Which makes their validity questionnable. | | Ant | | _______________________________________________ | foundation-l mailing list | foundation-l@wikimedia.org | http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On 11/16/06, ATR alex756@nyc.rr.com wrote:
The fact of the matter was that Jimbo applied for the MediaWiki trademark and then I fixed the application afterwards. The term "MEDIAWIKI" is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. This was done after the foundation was created, not before. This was not hidden from anyone it is a matter of public record:
http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?regser=serial&entry=78507335
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=6lvb7s.3.1
As you can see from the database TESS record it clearly states that the trademark was: "FIRST USE: 20030808. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20030809" The foundation was incorporated on June 20, 2003, August 8-9, 2003 is subsequent to that date. Thus, this is after the Foundation was created, not before. It was first posted on Wikimedia project web pages and it was proposed to be used in that context, no other. The logo was not create before that date, but afterwards. How can you say you own something when a part of it belongs to someone else?
I think the normal method would be to hold a 51% stake in the company. In terms of copyright the normal method would be to prove it is a derivative of your work. While someone else would own part of the derivative you would still have a significant amount of ownership.
There is also a discussion about the creation & licensing of WMF trademarks and ownership by the foundation. I have not been able to find it, but when I do I will post it; this was the allusion I made to Jimbo being able to back up the fact that the Foundation expected people to grant the ownership of any logos to the foundation and not release them through some other license (why else would you create a logo for a brand, it makes no sense otherwise?)
It is quite posible to trademark something that copyright wise is in the public domain. For example "Shock and awe" has rather a lot of trademarks on it. In terms of copyright it is still in the public domain.
This is just there to try and prevent people from stripping off the information about the contributors to the project,
That would be the function of the GPL lisence
As far as the ownership of these things are concerned, if you do not have the right to release something into the public domain because it does not belong to you then you cannot later release it into the public domain as an afterthought and I would suggest that creating a logo that uses the trademarked term MediaWiki cannot be copyrighted by anyone other than the foundationno matter what the other people say, even if it is made up of a composite of public domain images (which do not have the licensing limitations of the GFDL or CC licenses).
Any derivatives would be automaticaly copyright the person who made them and the foundation if the foundation does indeed hold the copyright on the image which I am yet to encounter any evidence for. Useing them as a logo to promote a product would be more problimatical depending on the degree of simularity and the context but that lot gets messy and you know all this.
The only record of owning the trademark MEDIAWIKI is with the WMF, anyone else using it is a trademark infringement. Does it matter who owns the copyright or even if it is copyrightable because it may just be so generic as not to be subject to copyright, i.e. the brackets and the sunflower show no inherent creativity as elements, they are just standard symbols.
The flower is a photo of a 3D object. It is rather hard to come up with a situation in which a photo of a 3D object does not contain enough inherent creativity to qualify for copyright (may be even harder in the UK but no matter).
There is clearly a policy about Wikimedia logos being an exception to the content on Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Licensing "Use by Wikimedia only (the only non-free-licensed exceptions hosted here as well are Wikimedia logos and other designs copyrighted by the Wikimedia Foundation that are the trademarks, service marks or other design elements that identify the sites of the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation)"
If the Foundation board thinks this is incorrect they should have their General Counsel correct it or put people on Notice that anyone can use these logos for anything they want because they are on Commons and thus, according to the logic of some Wikipedians, must be released under the GFDL (even if they were never so released before being posted on Commons).
Rather a lot of commons is lisenced under free lisences other than GFDL.
The correctness of the statement is not an issue for the foundation since it appears it is not a crime to claim copyright on something that is in fact in the public domain (if it is then there are an awful lot of websites out there that are breaking it).
The MW logo is PD content and Anthere and I explicitly designated it as such. I'm not even going to get into any discussion about whether we could retroactively "un-PD" it, as I find such attempts to put content that has been explicitly released to the public under a proprietary license unethical.
Is it valuable for the MW logo to be copyrighted by the WMF? Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. I'm skeptical. I've seen dozens of wikis which have "remixed" the MW logo to make their own (put something else between the double square brackets etc.). I think that's pretty cool and has not created any confusion as far as I know, since MediaWiki is primarily a product rather than a community website of its own.
I suggest distinguishing strongly between the brand name MediaWiki and the picture used to represent it. One can be protected while the other is not.
After thinking about it and reading the comments of the two individuals (who just happen both to be WMF board members) whose alleged PD content makes up the logo and reconsidering what I posted before I have several comments/clarifications:
First, if something is so generic that it has no real content, i.e. a closeup of a sunflower and a set of brackets, it cannot be "released into the public domain" because it is already uncopyrightable; IMHO any such "license" is irrelevant as a matter of law. How is anyone going to know if one photo of a sunflower close up is the same as another? Can someone copyright a set of brackets? I don't think so, that seems silly to me, there is no real creativity there. Not everthing we do is protected by copyright law, so you cannot PD something that can't be PD, or if you want to suggest that it is PD that does not mean that trademark law cannot superseded by copyright law and people can use it in violation of trademark law just because someone said, "hey I released this into the public domain because I was just a volunteer for the organization that is now using it."
Putting together those two elements creates a logo, and a logo is covered by statutory & common trademark law. The basis principle of trademark law is that the trademark belongs to whomever uses it, here it has been in use by the Wikimedia Foundation, it was created on its servers and it belongs to it, anyone, even board members of the WMF cannot suggest that it belongs to them or can be transfered to some kind of "public ownership" because they are not using it "in commerce" and never did. Correct me if I am wrong. Otherwise it is Wikimedia Foundation that "owns" the logo, and all the underlying intellectual property rights to said logo, whatever such rights may be notwithstanding whatever anyone says or whatever they might have did, i..e., declaring such logo as being "public domain."
Creating a logo for "public domain use" is an absurdity, it is like mixing apples with oranges.There is no such thing as releasing a logo into the public domain, once logos fall into disuse they are no longer logos, just graphics; as Eric points out people can certainly create graphics that use parts of other graphics that are generic, that happens all the time and does not depend on the "public domain" just as no one "owns" words, no one owns basic symbols or reproductions of images that are so generic that no one can really tell who made those images. However if someone creates a "logo" that causes confusion with another logo, especially one that is protected by statutory trademark law the question is, does the owner care if the mark is diluted by such wrongful infringement? If the owner does nothing and/or its board members condone such action eventually that trademark will be worthless, but I would like to point out that board members owe a fiduciary duty to the organization(s) on which they sit.
I would like to note that I am discussing this issue publicly as volunteer not in any "official" or "unofficial" capacity. I am not disclosing anything here that is not a matter of public record.
Alex T Roshuk Attorney at law
----- Original Message ----- From: "Erik Moeller" erik@wikimedia.org To: "ATR" alex756@nyc.rr.com; "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" foundation-l@wikimedia.org Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 3:44 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Foundation logo : pain and suffering
| The MW logo is PD content and Anthere and I explicitly designated it | as such. I'm not even going to get into any discussion about whether | we could retroactively "un-PD" it, as I find such attempts to put | content that has been explicitly released to the public under a | proprietary license unethical. | | Is it valuable for the MW logo to be copyrighted by the WMF? Maybe it | is, maybe it isn't. I'm skeptical. I've seen dozens of wikis which | have "remixed" the MW logo to make their own (put something else | between the double square brackets etc.). I think that's pretty cool | and has not created any confusion as far as I know, since MediaWiki is | primarily a product rather than a community website of its own. | | I suggest distinguishing strongly between the brand name MediaWiki and | the picture used to represent it. One can be protected while the other | is not. | -- | Peace & Love, | Erik | | Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees | | DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed | in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official | position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
On 11/16/06, ATR alex756@nyc.rr.com wrote:
First, if something is so generic that it has no real content, i.e. a closeup of a sunflower and a set of brackets, it cannot be "released into the public domain" because it is already uncopyrightable;
The photo of the sunflower, and the crop thereof, are certainly copyrightable. My question would be: What exactly do we lose if we trademark only the name "MediaWiki", and make no attempt to protect the image?
On 11/16/06, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
The photo of the sunflower, and the crop thereof, are certainly copyrightable. My question would be: What exactly do we lose if we trademark only the name "MediaWiki", and make no attempt to protect the image?
People selling T-shirts with the logo on outside wikimedia and OS events? Someone useing it as the symbol for their softwear? There are various potential issues.
On 11/16/06, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
People selling T-shirts with the logo on outside wikimedia and OS events?
Go for it.
Someone useing it as the symbol for their softwear?
As long as they don't call it MediaWiki ...
Erik Moeller wrote:
On 11/16/06, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
People selling T-shirts with the logo on outside wikimedia and OS events?
Go for it.
Someone useing it as the symbol for their softwear?
As long as they don't call it MediaWiki ...
I am in 100% agreement with Erik.
--Jimbo
geni wrote:
On 11/16/06, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
The photo of the sunflower, and the crop thereof, are certainly copyrightable. My question would be: What exactly do we lose if we trademark only the name "MediaWiki", and make no attempt to protect the image?
People selling T-shirts with the logo on outside wikimedia and OS events? Someone useing it as the symbol for their softwear? There are various potential issues.
I can't speak for the entire board, of course, but I think that Erik, Anthere, and I at least have all weighed in during this thread to say that at the very least, for the flower logo which is part of the default install of the software, at least these board members are of the opinion that this is very different from all the other logos, and one which we have never had any interest in protecting or defending.
If we wanted to have a logo for mediawiki which is defendable, I suppose we would want to get a new one, because this one has been declared completely free of restrictions for so long that it is really not very defensible I think. And anyway, we have no interest in doing that.
If people want to make tshirts with the flower logo on it, and sell them, I doubt very much if at least these 3 board members would mind one bit. That's sort of what the point was of the decisions made in the past.
--Jimbo
On 11/16/06, ATR alex756@nyc.rr.com wrote:
First, if something is so generic that it has no real content, i.e. a closeup of a sunflower and a set of brackets, it cannot be "released into the public domain" because it is already uncopyrightable; IMHO any such "license" is irrelevant as a matter of law.
The creative elements would be the angle from which the photo was taken and the lighting
How is anyone going to know if one photo of a sunflower close up is the same as another?
We manage: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Sunflower
Can someone copyright a set of brackets?
Under some conditions yes
I don't think so, that seems silly to me, there is no real creativity there.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illuminated_manuscript
Not everthing we do is protected by copyright law, so you cannot PD something that can't be PD, or if you want to suggest that it is PD that does not mean that trademark law cannot superseded by copyright law and people can use it in violation of trademark law just because someone said, "hey I released this into the public domain because I was just a volunteer for the organization that is now using it."
Copyright and trademark are two different areas. One does not supersed the other since they are not dealing with the same issues.
Putting together those two elements creates a logo, and a logo is covered by statutory & common trademark law. The basis principle of trademark law is that the trademark belongs to whomever uses it, here it has been in use by the Wikimedia Foundation, it was created on its servers and it belongs to it, anyone, even board members of the WMF cannot suggest that it belongs to them or can be transfered to some kind of "public ownership" because they are not using it "in commerce" and never did. Correct me if I am wrong. Otherwise it is Wikimedia Foundation that "owns" the logo, and all the underlying intellectual property rights to said logo, whatever such rights may be notwithstanding whatever anyone says or whatever they might have did, i..e., declaring such logo as being "public domain."
Not at all. The foundation owns the trademark rights. No evidence it owns any of the other potential IP rights.
Creating a logo for "public domain use" is an absurdity,
Several major religions would disagree with you there
You appear to be useing the word logo when you mean trademark.
Imagine a person makes a photo of a sunflower field. There are several sunflowers, some green stuff, light, insects... I am sure you would agree it is a "copyrigtable" picture. There is a creative work here.
Then, imagine you put this image under GFDL. As such, any derivative of the image ... must say under GFDL.
Now, imagine a new person comes and decide to pick up an element in the image. Make a crop of a flower. Then remove all the background. Enhance a bit the color. Smooth the borders. Add a pinch of light here. Darken a bit there. There is a creative work here. And it is a derivative.
Should not it stay under GFDL ?
I'd say yes.
At best, you may consider it a sort of something under fair use.
But to claim it is not copyrightable is, at best, shocking.
Ant
ATR wrote:
After thinking about it and reading the comments of the two individuals (who just happen both to be WMF board members) whose alleged PD content makes up the logo and reconsidering what I posted before I have several comments/clarifications:
First, if something is so generic that it has no real content, i.e. a closeup of a sunflower and a set of brackets, it cannot be "released into the public domain" because it is already uncopyrightable; IMHO any such "license" is irrelevant as a matter of law. How is anyone going to know if one photo of a sunflower close up is the same as another? Can someone copyright a set of brackets? I don't think so, that seems silly to me, there is no real creativity there. Not everthing we do is protected by copyright law, so you cannot PD something that can't be PD, or if you want to suggest that it is PD that does not mean that trademark law cannot superseded by copyright law and people can use it in violation of trademark law just because someone said, "hey I released this into the public domain because I was just a volunteer for the organization that is now using it."
Putting together those two elements creates a logo, and a logo is covered by statutory & common trademark law. The basis principle of trademark law is that the trademark belongs to whomever uses it, here it has been in use by the Wikimedia Foundation, it was created on its servers and it belongs to it, anyone, even board members of the WMF cannot suggest that it belongs to them or can be transfered to some kind of "public ownership" because they are not using it "in commerce" and never did. Correct me if I am wrong. Otherwise it is Wikimedia Foundation that "owns" the logo, and all the underlying intellectual property rights to said logo, whatever such rights may be notwithstanding whatever anyone says or whatever they might have did, i..e., declaring such logo as being "public domain."
Creating a logo for "public domain use" is an absurdity, it is like mixing apples with oranges.There is no such thing as releasing a logo into the public domain, once logos fall into disuse they are no longer logos, just graphics; as Eric points out people can certainly create graphics that use parts of other graphics that are generic, that happens all the time and does not depend on the "public domain" just as no one "owns" words, no one owns basic symbols or reproductions of images that are so generic that no one can really tell who made those images. However if someone creates a "logo" that causes confusion with another logo, especially one that is protected by statutory trademark law the question is, does the owner care if the mark is diluted by such wrongful infringement? If the owner does nothing and/or its board members condone such action eventually that trademark will be worthless, but I would like to point out that board members owe a fiduciary duty to the organization(s) on which they sit.
I would like to note that I am discussing this issue publicly as volunteer not in any "official" or "unofficial" capacity. I am not disclosing anything here that is not a matter of public record.
Alex T Roshuk Attorney at law
----- Original Message ----- From: "Erik Moeller" erik@wikimedia.org To: "ATR" alex756@nyc.rr.com; "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" foundation-l@wikimedia.org Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 3:44 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Foundation logo : pain and suffering
| The MW logo is PD content and Anthere and I explicitly designated it | as such. I'm not even going to get into any discussion about whether | we could retroactively "un-PD" it, as I find such attempts to put | content that has been explicitly released to the public under a | proprietary license unethical. | | Is it valuable for the MW logo to be copyrighted by the WMF? Maybe it | is, maybe it isn't. I'm skeptical. I've seen dozens of wikis which | have "remixed" the MW logo to make their own (put something else | between the double square brackets etc.). I think that's pretty cool | and has not created any confusion as far as I know, since MediaWiki is | primarily a product rather than a community website of its own. | | I suggest distinguishing strongly between the brand name MediaWiki and | the picture used to represent it. One can be protected while the other | is not. | -- | Peace & Love, | Erik | | Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees | | DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed | in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official | position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
ATR wrote:
After thinking about it and reading the comments of the two individuals (who just happen both to be WMF board members) whose alleged PD content makes up the logo and reconsidering what I posted before I have several comments/clarifications:
First, if something is so generic that it has no real content, i.e. a closeup of a sunflower and a set of brackets, it cannot be "released into the public domain" because it is already uncopyrightable; IMHO any such "license" is irrelevant as a matter of law. How is anyone going to know if one photo of a sunflower close up is the same as another? Can someone copyright a set of brackets? I don't think so, that seems silly to me, there is no real creativity there.
Explain that to any logo creator. He will be happy to learn that his job encompass no creativity. Sorry, but no. Making a logo is creation. Try to ask a robot to make you the logo which exactly fits with your company and its spirit, I guess you will not get something very valuable.
Not everthing we do
is protected by copyright law, so you cannot PD something that can't be PD, or if you want to suggest that it is PD that does not mean that trademark law cannot superseded by copyright law and people can use it in violation of trademark law just because someone said, "hey I released this into the public domain because I was just a volunteer for the organization that is now using it."
Putting together those two elements creates a logo, and a logo is covered by statutory & common trademark law. The basis principle of trademark law is that the trademark belongs to whomever uses it, here it has been in use by the Wikimedia Foundation, it was created on its servers and it belongs to it, anyone, even board members of the WMF cannot suggest that it belongs to them or can be transfered to some kind of "public ownership" because they are not using it "in commerce" and never did.
Excuse me here, but are you saying that every little bit an editor adds to wikipedia, just because it was created on WMF servers, belongs to WMF ?
Correct me if I am
wrong. Otherwise it is Wikimedia Foundation that "owns" the logo, and all the underlying intellectual property rights to said logo, whatever such rights may be notwithstanding whatever anyone says or whatever they might have did, i..e., declaring such logo as being "public domain."
Creating a logo for "public domain use" is an absurdity, it is like mixing apples with oranges.There is no such thing as releasing a logo into the public domain, once logos fall into disuse they are no longer logos, just graphics; as Eric points out people can certainly create graphics that use parts of other graphics that are generic, that happens all the time and does not depend on the "public domain" just as no one "owns" words, no one owns basic symbols or reproductions of images that are so generic that no one can really tell who made those images. However if someone creates a "logo" that causes confusion with another logo, especially one that is protected by statutory trademark law the question is, does the owner care if the mark is diluted by such wrongful infringement? If the owner does nothing and/or its board members condone such action eventually that trademark will be worthless, but I would like to point out that board members owe a fiduciary duty to the organization(s) on which they sit.
Yes. And afaik, board members also are supposed to have a say in the trademark strategy followed by the organisation on which they sit.
I would like to note that I am discussing this issue publicly as volunteer not in any "official" or "unofficial" capacity. I am not disclosing anything here that is not a matter of public record.
I'll stop that troll here.
But it was interesting and help me to open my eyes.
Anthere
Alex T Roshuk Attorney at law
----- Original Message ----- From: "Erik Moeller" erik@wikimedia.org To: "ATR" alex756@nyc.rr.com; "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" foundation-l@wikimedia.org Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 3:44 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Foundation logo : pain and suffering
| The MW logo is PD content and Anthere and I explicitly designated it | as such. I'm not even going to get into any discussion about whether | we could retroactively "un-PD" it, as I find such attempts to put | content that has been explicitly released to the public under a | proprietary license unethical. | | Is it valuable for the MW logo to be copyrighted by the WMF? Maybe it | is, maybe it isn't. I'm skeptical. I've seen dozens of wikis which | have "remixed" the MW logo to make their own (put something else | between the double square brackets etc.). I think that's pretty cool | and has not created any confusion as far as I know, since MediaWiki is | primarily a product rather than a community website of its own. | | I suggest distinguishing strongly between the brand name MediaWiki and | the picture used to represent it. One can be protected while the other | is not. | -- | Peace & Love, | Erik | | Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees | | DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed | in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official | position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
On 11/16/06, ATR alex756@nyc.rr.com wrote:
Putting together those two elements creates a logo, and a logo is covered by statutory & common trademark law. The basis principle of trademark law is that the trademark belongs to whomever uses it, here it has been in use by the Wikimedia Foundation, it was created on its servers and it belongs to it, anyone, even board members of the WMF cannot suggest that it belongs to them or can be transfered to some kind of "public ownership" because they are not using it "in commerce" and never did. Correct me if I am wrong. Otherwise it is Wikimedia Foundation that "owns" the logo, and all the underlying intellectual property rights to said logo, whatever such rights may be notwithstanding whatever anyone says or whatever they might have did, i..e., declaring such logo as being "public domain."
The Wikimedia Foundation doesn't "own" the logo. They might own a trademark on the logo. They don't own the copyright on the original logo, because they didn't create it, not even as a work for hire (the author was not an employee at the time they created the image, and the author did not "expressly agree in a written instrument signed by them that the work shall be considered a work made for hire").
Whether or not the WMF owns the trademark is actually a more difficult question. A trademark doesn't actually belong "to whomever uses it", in order to obtain a trademark it has to be used with some degree of exclusivity.
Are others using the Mediawiki logo in commerce? I would think there probably are. Is this use significant enough? I have no idea.
Anthony
For the record, I am shocked by your entire email. Deeply.
ATR wrote:
The fact of the matter was that Jimbo applied for the MediaWiki trademark and then I fixed the application afterwards. The term "MEDIAWIKI" is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. This was done after the foundation was created, not before. This was not hidden from anyone it is a matter of public record:
http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?regser=serial&entry=78507335
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=6lvb7s.3.1
As you can see from the database TESS record it clearly states that the trademark was: "FIRST USE: 20030808. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20030809" The foundation was incorporated on June 20, 2003, August 8-9, 2003 is subsequent to that date. Thus, this is after the Foundation was created, not before. It was first posted on Wikimedia project web pages and it was proposed to be used in that context, no other. The logo was not create before that date, but afterwards.
I never argued that the Foundation never applied to the tm. Nor that it tried to hide it. I object to your statement that the authors of the logo (Erik and for a very little part myself) were informed that the logo would be trademarked by the Foundation. THis is false and you know it.
How can you say you own something when a part of it belongs to someone else?
??? Sorry. Belongs to who ? If you intend to claim I am not the author of the flower picture because it belongs to the Foundation, I think you are showing a badly twisted mind.
Also Brion was aware of the trademark application and knows that the trademark has been registered by the foundation: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/htdig/foundation-l/2005-November/004774.ht... |"5) The Foundation may own the trademark on the name MediaWiki, which |postdates the creation of the software itself. | |6) A trademark registration for the mark was filed last year on behalf |of the foundation, though it hasn't totally gone through yet. (I'm not |the person to ask for details on that.) | |-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)"
The fact that Brion knew and agreed is not the proof all developers knew and agreed. Are you saying here that Brion is the only author and the only person whose opinion matters ?
Brion acknowledges that the foundation was getting a registration for the trademark, he or other developers never opposed this registration. They probably would find it very difficult to overturn that registratino now if they tried.
I agree. That's why I say there is a sufficient history.
There is also a discussion about the creation & licensing of WMF trademarks and ownership by the foundation. I have not been able to find it, but when I do I will post it; this was the allusion I made to Jimbo being able to back up the fact that the Foundation expected people to grant the ownership of any logos to the foundation and not release them through some other license (why else would you create a logo for a brand, it makes no sense otherwise?)
I would be intereested to see this email, which of course would have to have been posted PRIOR to the logo contest. Afaik, there is no such email.
The fact of a logo being made up of PD images, does not mean that someone can cannot recognize that MEDIAWIKI links back to WMF. It is up to the foundation to police that. If any people think they own it they can hire lawyers and bring the appropriate legal action to get the trademark invalided and then the foundation can either fight that or give it up. That seems really silly to me because the foundation is not making money out of this, (any suggestion is ridiculous because it is released under the GPL which allows free copying and alteration).
Wake up Alex ! The fact a software is under gpl does not imply no one will try to make money on it. The Foundation could do that, just as Red Hat is making money with Linux. This suggestion is in no way ridiculous.
This is just there to try
and prevent people from stripping off the information about the contributors to the project, there is really not much else that the foundation can do because the software is released under the GPL anyway. It just keeps the WMF flavor of MediaWiki distinct from all others. Is that really something anyone needs to fight about or that we want to deny because individuals want everything in the public domain and do not care about the moral rights of authors, such as the right of attribution (which is still rightfully protected by most so called "copyleft" licenses because it is not an economic right but a right normally considered part of the "droit d'auteur" bundle of rights associated with intellectual work that countries like France and Canada recognize as being as important or even more important than the economic rights (unfortunately the USA has very limited moral rights protections for creators).
As far as the ownership of these things are concerned, if you do not have the right to release something into the public domain because it does not belong to you then you cannot later release it into the public domain as an afterthought and I would suggest that creating a logo that uses the trademarked term MediaWiki cannot be copyrighted by anyone other than the foundationno matter what the other people say, even if it is made up of a composite of public domain images (which do not have the licensing limitations of the GFDL or CC licenses).
This is an absolutely outrageous comment Alex. You are here saying that because the name Mediawiki was added to the logo after its creation (the logo was created in summer 2003, for the Wikipedia contest, so originally, it did not have the Mediawiki word in it), I lost my right to release an image that *I* authored under the license I wish.
Are you realising what you are saying ?
I do not care the image is "embedded" in the logo, but the image itself has an independant life and no one has the right to strip me of my author rights on it. It is shocking to tell me I am not allowed to choose myself under which licence an image I produced should be released simply because later it is used in a tm logo.
The only record of owning the trademark MEDIAWIKI is with the WMF, anyone else using it is a trademark infringement. Does it matter who owns the copyright or even if it is copyrightable because it may just be so generic as not to be subject to copyright, i.e. the brackets and the sunflower show no inherent creativity as elements, they are just standard symbols.
Excuse me ?
The sunflower is NOT a symbol. It is a photo I took myself in a perfectly good sunflower field. They were 2 meters high. I had to find a way to reach the flower. Find a way to take a close up of it even though I was nearly escalating the plant. Find a way to escape the sun to have the right light. And it is to be considered generic with no author right ?
What will you say to the thousands of wikipedians who took a picture of a device, of a monument, or of a painting. That it is just generic and that they actually do not own any right on it and that it can not be subject to copyright ?
This
reminds me of the dispute with that Neo-Nazi group that tried to claim it owned copyright in some symbol that was clearly not subject to copyright: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Arrow_Cross but of course the consensus on this issue seemed to be that they actually owned the copyright and the images were taken off Wikipedia because no one really seemed to want to fight these fascists.
And you even reach the godwin point.
That will be it for me.
Anthere
We should be congnizant of the need to only fight battles that are important, not every fact dispute that exists because the reality is that there are a lot of these disputes and the resources to fight them are limited.
There is clearly a policy about Wikimedia logos being an exception to the content on Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Licensing "Use by Wikimedia only (the only non-free-licensed exceptions hosted here as well are Wikimedia logos and other designs copyrighted by the Wikimedia Foundation that are the trademarks, service marks or other design elements that identify the sites of the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation)"
If the Foundation board thinks this is incorrect they should have their General Counsel correct it or put people on Notice that anyone can use these logos for anything they want because they are on Commons and thus, according to the logic of some Wikipedians, must be released under the GFDL (even if they were never so released before being posted on Commons).
Alex T. Roshuk, Attorney
----- Original Message ----- From: "Anthere" Anthere9@yahoo.com To: foundation-l@wikimedia.org Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 12:25 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Foundation logo : pain and suffering
| ATR wrote: | > | > |> > I don't think the foundation owns the mediawiki logo. Copyright wise | > |> > it is in the public domain. | > |> Hoi, | > |> Given the age of the thing it cannot be PD yet. They are part of a | > |> trademark and as such they are owned by the Foundation. They can if they | > |> so choose license the logos. This is problematic because the rights that | > |> are usual for other WMF content contrasts with the requirement of | > |> maintaining the trademark. | > | | > |No, the MediaWiki one really is public domain. | > |http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:MediaWiki-smaller-logo.png | > | | > |Whether or not it is also a trademark of the Foundation doesn't affect | > |its copyright status. | > | | > |Angela. | > | > Someone cannot declare a work PD just by copying it. It seems the | > actual logo was created by Eric Moller, and it has always been the | > understanding with all logos that they were "works made for hire" for | > the foundation. This has been discussed previously and Jimbo can | > back this up. Just because someone put a PD tag on the page at | > Commons does not invalidate the Foundation's claim to this logo. | > | > As far as the "trademark" status of the logo, the word MEDIAWIKI is | > a registered mark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. I know this because | > I am the attorney of record on the USPTO file that granted this mark to | > the foundation. Also the actual logo is also a mark of the Wikimedia | > Foundation Inc., and is used to identify the MediaWiki software which | > is released by the Foundation and is a foundation project. | > | > Of course all trademarks can also be used based upon principles of | > fair use that apply to trademarks in a similiar way as copyrights. The | > important issue is that the mark is not used in a way to confuse the | > public or dilute the brand which the mark represents as this is the kind | > of protection that the law affords mark holders. | > | > Alex T Roshuk | > Attorney at law | | | Can I put my feet in the mud here ? | | The logo was a creation of Erik. The flower is from me (see here: | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tournesol%28L%29.jpg) | | After the end of the contest, Erik decided to use that logo for | mediawiki. At this time, it was not clear at all the logos would be | trademarked by the Foundation. The truth is we had no idea at that time | how important trademarks would be in the future. Well, the Foundation | was created only a couple of months before the international contest for | logos. There was no set up board. There were no board decision. There | were no resolution. In short, there is absolutely no trackable way to | prove there was an understanding the Foundation would own the trademark. | This is just bullshit. There was no clear understanding. We were young, | we did not know. Period. | | My memory is also very clear that developers did not want the mediawiki | logo and name to be owned by the Foundation. Of course, in real life, | anyone can claim to own a trademark on something that nobody else claim. | So, the Foundation asked to own the trademark of this, and now does. And | with most developers now making a living thanks to the Foundation, I | doubt very much any of them would ever make a complain over this. There | is now a history. | | Several months after the logo started being used for mediawiki, Erik | asked me if I would put the flower image under public domain. Again, I | did not know much about copyright and author rights at that time. At | this point, the image was under GFDL, which made no sense for a logo, | and no sense for what we wanted it to be used for. It may be that | another licence would have been better. | | The mediawiki software is very arguably a Foundation project as you | claim. For a long time, it was not. And the developers did not want it | to be. It seems the Foundation just decided at some point that it was. | Apparently. | The problem I have with this statement, is that I far as I know, I have | been on the board of trustees since june 2004, and I have NO memory we | ever decided that mediawiki was a wikimedia project. For all I know, it | is not. And for now, the Foundation website does not claim it is : | http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Our_projects. | | It is definitly a software we are using. Developers are largely | improving it for our projects. But others are improving it as well. The | main *ownership* of mediawiki is related to the main developers being | now paid by the Foundation. It may be a wikimedia project in this that | we largely support its development. But it is not officially a wikimedia | project. Period. | | Now, understand it well. I *prefer* that the Foundation owns the logo | and name trademarks, because as you say, it means the logo and name can | not be misused to confuse public. | | However, contrariwise to Wikipedia, the mediawiki software is not only | used by the Foundation, but by also thousands of projects around the | world. The worse thing that could happen is that people deciding to use | the mediawiki find themselves obliged to ask permission or even worse to | pay the Foundation to use the software, use the name, use the little | logo, powered by Mediawiki. If something like this ever occurs in the | future, I hope developers will consider changing the name, changing the | logo and make it possible for the software to spread freely. This is | what is important, and as long as the Foundation respects this spirit, | and only defend the logo and name against bad uses, I am fine with the | current situation. | | In the end, I am only pissed of to see claims about what the Foundation | owns, said, agreed to, blahblahblah, provided with the stamp "Jimbo can | back this up". The Foundation is governed by a board. And as Angela will | probably agree to, there are some decisions which were never made by the | board. Which makes their validity questionnable. | | Ant | | _______________________________________________ | foundation-l mailing list | foundation-l@wikimedia.org | http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
IANAL
On 11/16/06, Anthere anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
??? Sorry. Belongs to who ? If you intend to claim I am not the author of the flower picture because it belongs to the Foundation, I think you are showing a badly twisted mind.
Trademark rights under certian contexts belong to the foundation. Since you released it into the public domain the copyright probably belongs to no one (the slightly quibble is based on the question of is it in fact posible to release your work into the public domain but that is a seperate question)
Are you realising what you are saying ?
I do not care the image is "embedded" in the logo, but the image itself has an independant life and no one has the right to strip me of my author rights on it.
You did that when you released it into the public domain. You have no control over derivatives. In this case the derivative is also in the public domain copyright wise.
It is shocking to tell me I am not allowed to choose myself under which licence an image I produced should be released simply because later it is used in a tm logo.
I think Alex is mixing up trademark law and copyright law. However tradmark does impose some limits. You would not be able to use your image to market your own brand of wiki for example.
Excuse me ?
The sunflower is NOT a symbol. It is a photo I took myself in a perfectly good sunflower field. They were 2 meters high. I had to find a way to reach the flower. Find a way to take a close up of it even though I was nearly escalating the plant. Find a way to escape the sun to have the right light. And it is to be considered generic with no author right ?
The stuff where you chose the lighting conditions would give you a solid copyright claim based on the case law I have seen. The effort to get into that position would not (the law does not appear to diffurentuate between takeing one step to the side to snap a photo and climbing up mountians in a war zone to take a photo).
geni wrote:
I do not care the image is "embedded" in the logo, but the image itself has an independant life and no one has the right to strip me of my author rights on it.
You did that when you released it into the public domain. You have no control over derivatives. In this case the derivative is also in the public domain copyright wise.
I understand that. If I remember well, I never put the original image on wiki. So, by default, it is under traditional cp.
There are also two derivative.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tournesol%28L%29.jpg is under GFDL. Made on a rainy day.
And this one is a collaborative creation of antfish. http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Bouquet_fleurs.png It is under a dual license, gfdl and a cc.
Finally, the cropped image is PD. May it have a long and fruitful life embedded in the mediawiki logo (unless it is replaced one day)
And as a wikithank across all of our projects. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tournesol.png (for wikithanks on enwiki). Gfdl
Eh, last derivative, 6th of nov 2006: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Greetings_Barnstar.png Gfdl
Licensing mess...
I think the point is that the sunflower logo was one which we wanted to have as the default logo for all installations, and we wanted people to be able to happily use it or do whatever they wanted with it, and we did NOT intend to protect it or license it in any restrictive way. Not that particular one. That's because it is the default logo in the default install of the software, see.
This is not about the foundation logo, the wikipedia logo, etc., all of which are trademarks and copyright to the foundation, etc.
The sunflower one is one we don't really care about, except of course we love it with all our hearts. :)
Now, as to whether it is literally "public domain" (which is really rather a bit hard to do under US law), I leave to lawyers to figure out. Whether it is a trademark that the Foundation chooses not to defend, or a trademark which the Foundation freely licenses, or not a trademark at all, is a question I also leave to lawyers to figure out.
The point is, people can do as they like with it, and the Foundation does not mind.
This discussion, to repeat, applies ONLY to the sunflower logo which is the default install in the mediawiki software.
--Jimbo
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