[Foundation-l] Foundation logo : pain and suffering

[geni]

On 11/16/06, ATR <alex756 at 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).


-- 
geni