Re: None FLOSS license for a logo?
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 at 11:34, Simon McVittie <smcv@debian.org> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 at 10:50:57 +0200, Roberto A. Foglietta wrote:
> > On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 at 10:45, <c.buhtz@posteo.jp> wrote:
> > > We plan to have our own logo and thinking about how to license this. It
> > > might come to the case that the logo file (e.g. logo.svg, logo.png,
> > > logo.ico) won't be licensed with an OSI accepted licence but with a more
> > > closed license. This is because we don't want to get this logo used in
> > > other contexts. The logo should be exclusive to the project. I am not
> > > sure how to achieve this in another way.
> >
> > Reasonable. Then CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 is your match.
> >
> > https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/?ref=chooser-v1
>
> This is not a Free Software license and would not be allowed in Debian:
> both the -NC (non-commercial use only) and the -ND (no derivative
> works) disqualify it from being Free Software.
A logo is not a software. A logo displayed into a software does not
change the nature of the work, as free software. In particular,
because logo and trademark can be adopted in "fair use". In
particular, the trademark protects the owner from those wishing to
leverage the logo for any kind of action that interferes negatively
with their business. Hence, if I made a shirt with a Coca-Cola logo,
they can ask me to stop producing and selling them because THEY want
to do that but they cannot say anything about my personal shirt that I
made for myself, unless I do with that shirt things that purposely aim
to hurt their business or company reputation.
IMHO and AFAIK whatever that can be beautifully explained in perfect
legalese language can be summarized into: "we are scared to face some
legal charges". This is another completely different kind of story.
Was Debian scared of facing legal charges including NVIDIA libraries
and drivers? (old but still gold topic). Strangely not. LOL
> Most non-Debian Linux
> distributions have different rules for executable code (must be
> Free Software under a suitable license) and non-code artifacts like
> documentation and logos (must be redistributable but not necessarily
> Free Software), but Debian does not distinguish.
Almost non-Debian Linux are not driven by ideology - what's about the
closed-source proprietary firmware into ISO installation debate and
ending result? - hence they are not scared to face legal charges or
find themselves in a trial. ;-)
>
> If your goal is to prevent your project name or logo from being used in
> ways that would be misleading to users/consumers (for example "passing
> off" an extensively modified version of your software as being the
> original, so that the developer of the modified version can benefit
> from your good reputation), then trademarks are the legal tool that's
> designed for that, not copyright. A strategy used in some projects (for
> example Firefox, Python, and Debian itself) is to have a Free Software
> *copyright* license for the logo, combined with a *trademark* license
> that has restrictions. Debian allows this.
Which is nothing else than a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 in practice, after all.
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 at 11:41, <c.buhtz@posteo.jp> wrote:
>
> What confuses me is that there are two relationships: 1) Between the
> logo author and the project 2) and between the project and the rest of
> the world.
These two relationships are unavoidable everytime someone (or a group
of people) shares their work, whatever the license is.
Moreover, the day you get out of the womb, you establish that kind of
relationship with someone else. It is called society! ROTFL
> I am not sure how to solve it.
I am sure you can. ;-)
Best regards, R-
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