Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

JavaRanch gets Cease And Desist From Sun

Posted by timothy on from the someone-patent-lawyermace dept.

demultiplexer writes: "JavaRanch, a not for profit, volunteer-driven site dedicated to Java and probably the world's most popular Java website outside Sun, received a "cease and desist" letter from Sun's lawyers earlier this year for alleged trademark violations. It is being asked to rename to something like "The Java(tm) Technology Ranch" or "The Ranch, a friendly place for Java(tm) technology greenhorns." Quite a mouthful. Negotiations with Sun have failed so far and the ranch now considers renaming to GeekRanch and broadening its scope. Read the full story in all its gory detail."

2 of 41 comments (clear)

  1. Call me stupid... by coyote-san · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Call me stupid, but what's the problem here? They're talking about the Java(tm) language and libaries developed and promoted by Sun, so the latter is well within its rights AND OBLIGATIONS in asking them to remember to add the "(tm)."

    Changing the URL may be overkill, but it's still very reasonable for "javaranch.com" to be the short name and the preferred name (title, first use in all documents, etc.) to be the more verbose form.

    As for comparisons to Microsoft Windows, this situation is totally different. "Window" has several specific meanings within the technical literature (Windowing GUI system, "window" and "viewport" in computer graphics, "window" into paged memory (a hack to get more memory than a processor's address space can handle into a system), etc.) In contrast, I'm not aware of any "java" use within the technical literature except as the beverage of choice for many developers.

    --
    For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
  2. Why Sun is doing this, and we should lay off. by Adocso · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Having written freelance for Sun, I can tell you they treat their own publications the same way. The Trademarks are on Java(tm) Technology. They want to keep that clean.

    It causes some stumbling in the writing sometimes too, but they believe it's the right thing to do.

    So give 'em a break here. It sucks, but if they let just anyone use the name any way they want, then the age-old canker with Redmond will re-erupt, with Bill claiming that others have done it, so "JavaStuff (tm), A Microsoft Product" is not really stomping on Sun's good name...