On Sun, Oct 09, 2011 at 08:02:01PM +0200, Stefano Zacchiroli wrote: > Problem statement > ================= > The question we need to answer is whether DFSG should be applied to > trademark licenses or not. Our answer to this question has always been "no" and should continue to be so. > The Debian logo > --------------- > As part of the impact analysis, we should also consider what it would > happen to the trademarks that *we* own. At present, the version of our > own logo with the "Debian" label is not DFSG-free [4]. This is > unfortunate both because of the message it sends and because we cannot > use the Debian official logo as part of Debian without making exceptions > to DFSG (which is ridiculous either way). > The reason of the non-DFSG-freeness of the Debian logo is that its > *copyright* license tries to do some sort of trademark protection as > part of its terms. Reifying trademark protection in a copyright license > is a bad thing per se, and I've been working with SPI lawyers to fix > that. The goal is to release the Debian logo under a common DFSG-free > license and have a separate, new, trademark policy [5]. This is a long overdue change; I'm glad to see some movement here. > Renouncing to trademark protection for Debian is another option, but > it'd be equivalent to giving up Debian trademarks. I don't think that > would be a wise choice. I agree. > Proposal > ======== > We need to decide together what to do about the presence of software > with trademark restrictions in the Debian archive. It would be nice to > reach consensus through simple discussion, but we can of course also > decide to vote on this matter. > My own proposal, that I submit to your consideration, is as follows: > - DFSG applies to copyright license; trademark restrictions should not > make a package DFSG non-free (philosophical part) > - however, trademark restrictions that get in the way of "usual Debian > procedures" should not be accepted in the Debian archive (practical > part) > What I've in mind here is stuff like having to either rebrand or ask > for permission before adding a security patch or other kind of > restrictions on changing code that has nothing to do with the > "identity" of upstreams that trademarks are supposed to protect. > Practically, I think the set of unacceptable restrictions should be > proposed by the people who would actually have to deal with this kind > of issues: security team (that might need to apply impromptu patches), > release team (that might be forced to rename packages in past release > upon change), ftp-masters (same reason as before), etc. Has the project received competent legal advice stating that a package name would be interpreted as infringing a trademark, and that we might have to rename it? Note that I am not talking about violating the terms of a trademark *license* here, which I maintain we generally have no reason to seek (or accept), but about whether such use infringes actual trademark rights directly. If we haven't received such advice, then I don't think there's any reason to worry about the possibility of patching a package resulting in a requirement to rename it, *unless* there are particular reasons that we believe we need a trademark license in the first place. Cheers, -- Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. Ubuntu Developer http://www.debian.org/ slangasek@ubuntu.com vorlon@debian.org
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