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SSC vs LinuxGazette.net Continued
An anonymous reader writes "To update an earlier story about the pending battle between SSC and LinuxGazette.net, it seems SSC has taken to officially asserting a trademark on the term 'Linux Gazette' and is asking them to relinquish the domain name. Interesting to note that LinuxGazette.net has issue 97 out, while SSC doesn't."
... should desist early and change the site name. And I mean any of both sites, perhaps both!
A name has worth, but friendship when lost is very hard to reacquire. Besides, what's important in that name? Is it "Linux" or "Gazette"?
Don't waste time.
I think if they filed for the trademark right after the fighting started it should not be that hard to win a court case.
I didn't use the preview button, so get over it!!!!
Mike
The webmaster of goatse.cx is suing the owners of both goatse.org and goatse.com.
There is a trademark registered to SSC. But the application date was Oct 28,2003. The very same day that Rick Moen notified Phil Hugh that they were moving the magazine accord to the LWN article [lwn.net].
SSC is playing dirty pool not the other around.
I noticed today www.mosfet.org is gone. What gives?
Interesting to note that LinuxGazette.net has issue 97 out, while SSC doesn't
But who had the trademark first, or who used the name first, doesn't matter to the WIPO mediator. According to past history, the only thing that matters to WIPO, is who has more money.
SCO Part II? The Sequel? The Return of the Son of SCO?
The sequel's NEVER as good as the original, and this case certainly isn't. I mean, the character development's just not there, and it looks like the budget's been slashed after the first SCO failed. Pretty soon, Microsoft will be paying people under the table to reveal that Linus is the name of that kid on Snoopy. Maybe Snoopy will sue us next...
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
Specific examples of our use of this trademark go back to 1996
Ok, but the first issue on LinuxGazette.net is July 1995, so is this claim of precedence bogus or am I missing something big here with respect to the history of this dispute?
As has been noted elsewhere, 1996 has been trumped.
Ph-nglui mglw'nafh Gates M'dna wgah'nagl fhtagn.
linuxgazette.com slashdotted.
linuxgazette.net still standing.
Seems like the trial is over to me...
The only thing corporations understand is money. Cancel your subscription to Linux Journal until SSC abandons this foolhardy path. You can always resubscribe.
The time to act is now, not after SSC has used the courts to screw over the community.
Anything worth doing is worth doing badly -- G.K. Chesterton
linuxgazette.net and linuxgazette.com are seperate entities.
Consensus is good, but informed dictatorship is better
Confusion about who owns what. This is just playing into the pockets of SCO who is spreading the "ownership is shady with Linux" meme.
Expect to see some major news outlet (Slashdot is not such) publish this news, and exaggerate it over the top.
oops SSC my bad
MoFscker
Can someone please clarify who www.linuxnj.com is/are and how they obtained this letter? I am not very happy with SSC over this situation but I would like to know who is providing this and what axes they have to grind. Verifying its authenticity would be helpful.
You shank my Jengaship!
The Hawaiians get all the vowels, the Russians all the consonants.
I think that Linux Journals origional creater would be pissed if he knew what SSC was doing to his publication. It started out as user driven. Now SSC just wants to commercialize it.
SSC is being childish with their trademark, C&D, etc. The ex-volunteers are being childish by starting a new service with a name and logo that is all but indistinguishable from the original.
.net volunteers are being nothing but childish by starting a spin-off that mimics the original service, by name and logo, and by actively telling people to unsubscribe from the old service. They should just take on a new name, do what they used to do well, and let the better service win. Respectably.
If the volunteers didn't like what SSC was doing, they should've done one of two things: stand and fight them, start a new service with a new name. History is full of instances where members of an organization became dissatisfied and started their own spin-off. In most of these cases, the spun-off group took on a new name and carried on as just another competitor, even if the members were the founders of the original org. This is the mature, respectable thing to do.
The
Why is everyone bashing SSC ? Okay, fine, it's a corporation going after the little, defenseless contributor who most likely, didn't get paid while giving their labor away. But something you have to note, is that SSC have been running the Linux Gazette since 1996, and it was only this year that the contributors started linuxgazette.net. Check out the domain registration dates :
Domain name: LINUXGAZETTE.NET
Record Created on 12-Jul-2003.
Domain Name: LINUXGAZETTE.COM
Record created on 18-Oct-1997.
Basically, the unpaid contributors didn't like where the company was going with the product, and decide to start their own, only they used the same name. Now, IANAL, but if that is not trying to cause confusion in the market, I don't know what is. SSC is in it's right as it's been exploiting the Linux Gazette name for longer, no matter when they decided to register it as a valid trademark.
Why must the slashbots always criticized corporations. Sometimes the little guy is just being a jerk.
"Not to mention all the idiots who use words like boxen."
Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, @06:49PM
The SSC version linuxgazette.com actually DOES have an issue 97 (December). You can read it here:
http://tldp.org/LDP/LG/issue97/index.html
Unfortunately their own home site is a bit hard to navigate.
It's all in the bible, explains why it happens (to the smallest detail), explains everything step by step, even explains how to avoid it. All without one word of prayer or belief in superstition.
A cycle of learning which goes beyond a few life time, the exception is scale of destruction.
linux.com or gazette.com each sound better than linuxgazette.com.
Of course they might linu.com and xgazette.com. xgazette.com would be a different kind of site.
This is an Open Development which will result in a Branded UNIX which will be freely distributed on the Internet in source and binary forms.
A lot has changed since issue 8 with respect to people's intentions....
Does anyone have an email address that can be used for sending comments on this matter to SSC? Their 'contact us' page only lists a snail-mail address.
First off.. let me tackle some of their "response points"
1. A product that is not commercial can still violate trademark. (Cite: www.uspto.gov)
2. LG stated that , in issue #8, they were going to e under the management of the SSC crew. Management implies content rights.
3. They state in their response that they feel a trademark does not exist. It does. It definately does. This can be checked at www.uspto.gov.
Whining like little brats will not solve the problem, and will only create more. LinuxGazette.net's response states that they will not change the name if they are forced to give up the domain, and that implies that they are perfectly willing to confuse the public about which is the real LG.
Trademark holder wins.
This achive of Issue # 8 seems to be unclear as to what happened when they started being hosted by Linux Journal.
That seems to support lg.net's position - Just a hosting arangement.
But..
That seems to show that Fisk is turning it over to SCC. If that is the case then this is SCC's baby now. You can see in the write up where each side is getting their views
Net result, this could have all been handled with a little more tact on both sides. If SCC had just followed the wishes of the people who produced the article, this wouldn't have been a problem.
It should have been the creators of the work, the volunteers, who should have been deciding on what direction the magazine should take. Not some marketroid who found way to suck $$, or techie who felt this was his site, and wanted to put up a CMS and/or excert his power.
I from what I read of #8, I would have to say SCC has the stronger argument, even if they have the
Though two sources of free online linux articles is better then one.
Time travel is possible. We are quickly heading for 1984.
Your aurgument is flawed since ALL of the regular contributing volunteers left, not "just a few".
They took the logo they made and used they also took the layout they used. However they now have changed the layout and logo, since they do not have the deep pockets of their opponent.
You need to check out:
I Cringley and read why Robert X Cringley does not even have the rights to his own name in a certain unscrupulous magazine. However he can write under his own name elsewhere and that magazine can't stop him.
If Slashdot decides to allow AOL-TimeWarner to host this site, that does not give the host rights to change Slashdot.org into a static webpage, or a subscription only clone of Time magazine.
It all boils down to who owns copyright, the creator of the work or the publisher of the work. SSC published what the LG volunteers created.
Suppose that www.groklaw.net did NOT file a trademark for Groklaw.
PJ becomes very popular.
I see that and file a trakemark for Groklaw and then send PJ a cease and desist letter.
Which way do you think the courts would lean?
The problem is that COURTS COST MONEY.
SSC has more money than a volunteer organization.
It looks like I might have to cancel my subscription to Linux Journal if SSC doesn't start behaving like reasonable adults.
That's content management systems for ya.
You are discussing who's right or wrong. That's important, ok, but not the most important thing here.
I'm saying whoever wins will have a bitter victory, for the original idea was bringing fun to Linux.
This is not a cold "let's sit and discuss who's right". This is about stopping a fight before it gets ugly, if necessary with loss of rights! The winner of this won't look good, anyway, so why getting hands dirty?
In other words, it's not your name that makes you, it's you who makes your name.
Of course, this all could have possibly been made for astroturfing the site... then *sigh*, let the show continue...
Sorry, pal, this response is not for you. This Slash code needs serious improvement, and I need to be more careful. I replied on the wrong thread. DOH!
Sorry for any inconvenience, I misunderstood your post.
Last month I pitched a story idea to Don Marti (editor of Linux Journal) and he told me to contact Heather Mead (web editor for same). We agreed that I'd write a 3-part article to be run on the LJ website, with the first part due on December 3.
As soon as this story broke on December 2, I emailed Heather asking for clarification and explanation from their side, as I was especially concerned about the apparent appropriation of other people's work, since I had been planning to place the articles on a website of my own after their run on the LJ website. To date I have received no reply.
Posted with Mozilla
= 9J =
Care to cite the thing ? Or are you too afraid of a copyright violation ?
I think they are doing option one, namely "stand and fight them". .com, but they have the .net.
They are keeping their name, they can't control the
I don't see anyone suggesting Linus take a new name and fork Linux, or RMS take a new name and fork GNU.
We didn't "leave because we don't like CMSs" (Phil Hughes's claim)
It wasn't "some of the volunteers" (Phil Hughes's claim) but rather 100% of the staff by unanimous decision
We didn't spring the decision to move on SSC by surprise at the last minute (Phil Hughes's claim), but rather had warned them for months about what would happen if they went ahead with their plan.
The editors moved LG to new quarters in part because SSC had said the monthly magazine would cease to exist entirely. (We had no idea SSC would change its mind later and direct uncredited SSC employees to resume producing issues at our old site.) I.e., we actually don't think it's OK to "open up a new site under exactly the same name, even using the same logo", nor were we starting "a spinoff under the same name"; it was a question of move the magazine or let SSC kill the magazine by corporate decree, according to everything they'd told us.
Founder John M. Fisk, in 1996, transferred custody LG to SSC explicitly as a free magazine to be run in harmony with SSC's commercial magazine, Linux Journal. It was explicitly not to be a commercial property.
You cannot "own a name": You can own a commercial brand identity, but Linux Gazette has never been a commercial offering. SSC's assertion to the contrary in its USPTO filing is materially false.
Ownership of everything in LG is retained by each individual contributor, and issued to the public under an open-source licence -- just like with the Linux kernel
Even successful assertion of a trademark that you prove you own lets you enjoin only competing commercial goods or services using your mark in ways likely to confuse your customers into thinking those are your offerings. SSC's attempt to misuse trademark law -- in which they showed no interest for seven years until the very day we told them we were moving the magazine -- against our volunteer magazine seems to assume we're clueless techies and ignorant of trademark law fundamentals.
Discussion of the matter has been occurring at LWN. Here are my two recent posts:
"Chilling Effects" letter received from SSC, Inc.
(Posted Dec 5, 2003 9:05 UTC (Fri) by rickmoen) (Post reply)
Alan Cox wrote:
John Fisk founded Linux Gazette in 1995. He's not visibly part of either side of the argument which begs the question who did he give it to.
It's a fair question, and the top-level answer is that copyright over all content belongs to the individual authors, being published by each of them under an open-source licence (in LG's case, OPL v. 1.0, and two predecessor open-source licences for very early issues). Alan's no doubt very familiar with this concept. {grin}
Alan is of course thinking of some concept of ownership over the magazine as a whole, and that too is a fair question: The answer is that there's really nothing of that sort to own. The compilation copyright (if any) would likewise be OPL-licensed, and LG was from its inception explicitly a community, non-profit effort.
And that leaves an equally fair third question: What was it that John M. Fisk entrusted to SSC, Inc. -- subject to the promise to keep it non-commercial -- when medical school was keeping him too busy to keep things going? Please read again what John wrote: Phil Hughes and SSC, Inc. willingly assumed (and carried out admirably for many years) an obligation, a volunteer job, a custodianship.
And explicitly not over a corporate balance sheet asset, a lesson that Mr. Hughes seems to have f
> even using the same logo
Who owns the Copyright on the logo? That logo is clearly a work of the mark in question. Whomever owns that probably owns the mark.
Is this bad decision coming solely from Phil Hughes? I don't know much about the corporate structure of SSC, but maybe some here do: who exactly as SSC is the person with the authority to change this bad decision?
Anything worth doing is worth doing badly -- G.K. Chesterton
From: "me" me@notmydomain.org
i
e =6 83q64.1.1&p_search=searchss&p_L=50&BackReference=& p_plural=yes&p_s_PARA1=&p_tagrepl%7E%3A=PARA1%24LD &expr=PARA1+AND+PARA2&p_s_PARA2=someterm&p_tagrepl %7E%3A=PARA2%24COMB&p_op_ALL=ADJ&a_default=search& a_search=Submit+Query&a_search=Submit+Query
e =6 83q64.1.1&p_search=searchss&p_L=50&BackReference=& p_plural=yes&p_s_PARA1=&p_tagrepl%7E%3A=PARA1%24LD &expr=PARA1+AND+PARA2&p_s_PARA2=portionofsometerm& p_tagrepl%7E%3A=PARA2%24COMB&p_op_ALL=ADJ&a_defaul t=search&a_search=Submit+Query
To: nothisaddress@aol.com
Subject: Re: someterm is a registered trademark
Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2003 23:02:14 -0600
Now you were nice in your request so I will inform you that the usage of the
term in question was submitted by a user at the title of their website.
Since the user in question has updated the title of their website I have
updated the listing in question.
Research what exactly having a trademark entitles you to
http://www.chillingeffects.org/trademark/faq.cg
You need to understand that having a trademark in California does not
automatically grant you to that right either nationwide nor worldwide.
"A trademark is protected only within the geographic area where the mark is
used and its reputation is established. For federally registered marks,
protection is nationwide. For other marks, geographical use must be
considered. For example, if John Doe owns the mark Timothy's Bakery in
Boston, there is no infringement if Jane Roe uses Timothy's Bakery to
describe a bakery in Los Angeles."
According to the USPTO which is the official source for federal aka
nationwide trademarks in the United States the database which is searchable
online at
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=toc&stat
There is no registered trademark for the term someterm
A list of all registrations containing the word portionofsometerm is available at
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=toc&stat
I do not believe even in the presence of a trademark on a television show
title would preclude a website with a similar title provided the average
user would not mistake http://someurl.com with your business nor the
purpose of your registered trademark.
There is the secondary consideration of the fact the site in question is
clearly non-profit
"If no income is solicited or earned by using someone else's mark, this use
is not normally infringement. Trademark rights protect consumers from
purchasing inferior goods because of false labeling. If no goods or services
are being offered, or the goods would not be confused with those of the mark
owner, or if the term is being used in a literary sense, but not to label or
otherwise identify the origin of other goods or services, then the term is
not being used commercially. "
mysig
----- Original Message -----
From: nothisaddress@aol.com
To: someone@somedomain.com; me@notmydomain.org
Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2003 4:30 PM
Subject: someterm is a registered trademark
> The title or words someterm is a registered trademark which I own.
> My name is D. B. and I produce a show on public access TV in SF and I
have submitted and now own the trademark on the title someterm.
> Just a friendly reminder because I have noticed your websites using the
same words or title.
> Thank you.
"GET / HTTP/1.0" 200 51230 "-" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; Setec Astronomy)"
Why are the people who started Linux Gazette supposed to just abandon a brand they have worked hard to create? It has been their contributions of articles not SSC's dubious contribution of some free hosting. Though the Linux Gazette probably should have paid a token fee just to keep this sort of thing from happening $1 /year ).
The bottom line though is that the Linux Gazette people contributed to the brand. SSC did not. Therefore there exists no reason they should abandon it.
My two cents!
could they look any worse?
If trademark and other intellectual "property" thugs are the "pillars of our community," then we need some new pillars.
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
Let's try a real world analogy. Suppose I made a "Lost Pet Journal" of stray dogs and cats getting caught on the steet, to help them find back any owners, published this in every supermarket in the area every week.
Now some local print shop offers to print it for me for free because they like the initiative. After some time I can not continue, and some friends take over. It still gets printed for free.
Then the local print shop claims ownership of the "Lost Pet Journal" want to turn it into something else, but my friend don't like it and decide to have it printed somewhere else. Then the original shop also starts printing a "Lost Pet Journal" and claims the one my friends are making is a trademark infringement.
Anything wrong with this analogy? I leave you to draw your own conclusions.
RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor
If trademark and other intellectual "property" thugs are the "pillars of our community," then we need some new pillars.
If the OSS community is seen as having no respect for trademarks or intellectual property, it will never be considered legit by the corporate world. But, maybe you don't care, and think trademark infringement is funny.
Infringement, my ass. The mark was in use prior to SSC's hijacking of it. And I don't give a fiddly fig about OSS being seen as "legitimate."
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
Is that you Phil?
maybe i'm an idiot, but this all seems vaguely similar to a story i heard about a kid who 'appropriated' some software and went on to become head of a worldwide software giant...
...nyah, i'm just an idiot, never mind...
The problem is that the registration of a trademark doesn't make it valid, it only adds to the validity and allows a court to act (initially) under the assumption that it is.
Trademarks can and do exist without registration and registered trademarks can be found invalid or to be registered by the wrong party.