On Mon, 06 Aug 2012 10:46:34 +0100 Philip Hands wrote: > Francesco Poli <invernomuto@paranoici.org> writes: > > ... > > [...] > >> \item You cannot alter the DEBIAN trademarks in any way. > > [...] > >> \item Any scaling must retain the original proportions of the logo. > >> > >> \item Logo should only use ``official'' logo colors. > > [...] > > > > These restrictions are currently violated by countless uses of Debian > > logos (above all) and of the Debian textual trademark (sometimes). > > Several such uses are done by the Debian Project itself, most notably > > in desktop themes shipped as official Debian themes (for instance the > > very nice default wheezy theme, named Joy [2]). > > > > [2] http://wiki.debian.org/DebianArt/Themes/Joy > > > > I think that these restrictions should be dropped entirely, since they > > seem to be incompatible with the basic Free Software principles. > > There are some things that one needs to do simply to maintain a > trademark. I'm pretty sure that the bits you are objecting to are > included in that set (although IANAL). [...] > > Note that I'm not arguing that we _should_ have a trademark I don't know, maybe the Debian Project should not hold trademarks (through SPI or otherwise)... The fact is, are we sure that the "price" to pay for holding a trademark is forbidding things like the following wallpapers, for instance? http://debian-art.org/content/show.php/Debian+Wood?content=152000&PHPSESSID=06778f75eae318b9f3f0827945cca0f6 http://debian-art.org/content/show.php/Debian+Marble?content=151968&PHPSESSID=06778f75eae318b9f3f0827945cca0f6 http://www.superbwallpapers.com/computers/debian-7234/ http://www.superbwallpapers.com/computers/debian-7255/ http://www.superbwallpapers.com/computers/debian-7271/ http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Art+Debian+Wallpaper+The+New+Debian+Linux+Pics.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Cool+Debian+Dark+Wallpaper+Debian+Black+Wallpapers.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+1024X768+Wallpaper+Desktop+Simple+and+Cool+Debian+Logo.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Abstract+Wallpaper+Linux+I+Love+My+Debian.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Ball+Wallpaper+Linux+Debian+Try+The+New+Debian+Desktop.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Cloud+Linux+Wallpaper+Blue+Sky+on+Debian+Desktop.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+For+Desktop+Wallpaper+Debian+Project+Pictures.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Image+Wallpaper+Debian+Picture+Wallpaper+2008.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Linux+Gnu+Wallpapers+Desktop+Debian+Alternatives.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Picture+Wallpaper+Desktop+Wallpapers.jpg.html? http://www.wallpaperlinux.com/v/Debian/Debian+Plastik+Wallpaper+Linux+Debian+Desktop.jpg.html? and so forth, and so forth, and so forth, ... And if this is really the price to pay, isn't too high a price? > -- I'm with > Lars in that I think it's somewhat distasteful for Debian to be dirtying > our hands with this, but if that's the only way we can stop some bastard > From distributing "Official Debian CDs" that turn out to be packed with > back-doors and trojans, then we need to do the legal bits properly, and > that involves following the legal advice we receive, rather than > spouting unfounded drivel about what we might like the law to be. I am not a lawyer, and I have very little knowledge of trademark laws (I am a debian-legal regular, but we talk about copyrights much more often than about trademarks there...). It is not my intention to spout drivel, but I really hope that an acceptable solution exists *within the law* and *within Free Software principles* at the same time. Otherwise the Project should go a totally different way (maybe abandoning its trademarks, as said above, I don't know...). [...] > > That said, those granted the right to play with the trademark can > presumably do so. We just need to grant that permission in the cases > you seem concerned about. Grant special permissions to *all* those people wanting to create a wallpaper referring to Debian?!? And to *all* those people wanting to do other creative things with Debian trademarks/logos?!? I think that the only feasible way to do that is granting those permissions *inside* the trademark policy itself, which is not too different from dropping the restrictions I quoted, as I was suggesting... -- http://www.inventati.org/frx/frx-gpg-key-transition-2010.txt New GnuPG key, see the transition document! ..................................................... Francesco Poli . GnuPG key fpr == CA01 1147 9CD2 EFDF FB82 3925 3E1C 27E1 1F69 BFFE
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