Slashdot Mirror
Lindows becomes Lindash
Daveh writes "The Register is reporting that 'The operating system Lindows is now available as Lin---s (pronounced: Lin-dash) in those countries where Microsoft has blocked the availability of the desktop Linux distribution. The new name complies with a recent Amsterdam court ruling (PDF), the San Diego company says.' There are a few new sites to reflect the name change, including Lin---s.com and Lindash.nl."
But that is the stupidest name I have ever heard... I hope someone named Linda sues them :)
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
I guess that's one way to dash Microsoft's evil plan.
That's pretty f------ g--.
They obviously arn't happy about the change, seeing as how their current front-page picture shows a hang-man with only d, o, w left in the letter-box. (Lin_ _ _ s might be a better way to put it.)
"For years, I struggled with reality... but I'm happy to say I finally won out over it." -- Elwood P. Dowd
In a related story. Bill Gates has decided to rename Windows to be close to this product. The new proposed name is Balder-Dash (in honor of Steve Ballmer)
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
it's a bit slapdash
--
code newbie: help for coding newbies
the distro formerly known as LindowsOS would have been better.
changes name of of lindows to lind-hash.
BSD may be forced also to change it's name to BUD.
lysergically yours
Lin---s? I feel like I'm on some kind of game show.
I'd like to buy a vowel!
the names...
winix
uniwindows
linuows
microsnix
lindix
Next on Slashdot: Microsoft is suing all companies with products that start with a W.
Microsoft is now known as Micro---- (pronounced: Microdash). This is to settle a lesser known lawsuit with video game maker SquareSoft.
Lindows will now sue Microdash for trademark violations.
Will it ever end?
Cases like this boggle the mind. Now all they had to do was change their name to something (albeit strange) catchy, and they get even more free publicity. Windows on the other hand, continues to foster its bully image and ends up really not accomplishing too much at all.
What a waste of everyone's time and money.
F---edcompany maybe?
As a double bonus is gets around any Microsoft-friendly internet censorware that has lindows.com blocked as "terrorist" or "hate speech".
-JoeShmoe
.
-- I wonder which will go down in history as the bigger failure: the War on Drugs or the War on Filesharing
visionary [vi'sion'ar'y] adj 1. full of foresight: characterized by unusually acute foresight and imagination
Microsoft(R) Encarta(R) Reference Library 2002. (C) 1993-2001 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Good for Lindows. Too bad being a visionary is copyrighted by Microsoft.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
They could've renamed it Linfox instead.
Microsoft sues dictionary.com for trademark infringement.
- (-) n.
An opening constructed in a wall or roof that functions to admit light or air to an enclosure and is often framed and spanned with glass mounted to permit opening and closing.
At least they didn't rename themselves GNU/Xenix.
*gong*
I know it's easy to jump on MS, but let's be honest: Lindows, as a word, doesn't mean anything. It's just Windows with an L instead of a W. It is OBVIOUSLY trying to cash in on the Windows franchise.
Oh, and with a neat 95% of the marketplace, I think MS is winning in the free market. I think most Linux users actually dislike Lindows. Its a lame way to commercialize the OS.
God Bless America. Why? Did it sneeze?
They should just have something that reminds users that their LINUX (obviously, symbolized by a penguin) is HOT (symbolized by fire), so i would recommend they call their product "Firebird".
No really, it was funny when i first thought about it.
Free as in mason.
---!
"Lindash. Lindash. I like it. It sounds fast. It will make your computer run quickly. And it's Linux, so you know it'll be stable.
"Yeah, I like Lindash a lot. And it sounds WAY better than Laguar or Lanther."
Linuendows
Rmrember taht one?
My journal. Mainly about freedom.
How'm I supposed to search for "lin---s" in google, for example? Please don't break out the meta-escape, its already past time for a headache remedy on this Lindows name issue ...
;)
A better name would've been "Lintel", but okay, I guess the Dutch Govt' wouldn't have seen the humor in that name-switch, eh?
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
It would be a good homage to Homer Simpson too..
---- It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. It does this whenever it's told.
Oh for crap's sake. Can't they just get the Mozilla people to rattle off a few dozen name candidates? Their projects change names with every CVS commit.
--riney
"Yes, this is horrible, this idea." - Samir
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
Michael Robertson is as much interested in the fight with MS as the future of his company, which he is using as a vehicle. I don't necessarily think this is a bad thing - Lindows is privately held, after all, so he can do what he likes, and I respect his convictions. What Robertson really would like to see, I think even *more* than the success of Lindows, would be for a US court to strip Windows of trademark protection.
I think what they're doing is right on. Lindows tried protesting M$'s ridiculous assertion (that it can trademark a word common in the English language and in computing circles *before* there was ever a Microsoft Windows(tm)) in the courts. Now they can continue their protest of this ridiculous ruling via their new name... and they rightly should protest. The European ruling is idiotic.
The US courts are more reasonable, and likely won't let Microsoft pull words from the English language/computing circles like European courts have. Lindows is a great marketing name for a linux desktop solution, combining linux, a term the average joe may be unfamiliar with, with windows, a term most people use in reference to their computer everyday (not M$ Windows(tm), but those little boxes people are used to dealing with on their desktops in *any* OS environment, when they are instructed to "close the window" etc.). Trademarking the word "windows" is like trademarking the words "mouse" or "cursor".
I don't know much about the distro or the company... but I give them props for their name. Marketing wit is something the linux community can always use more of.
this gave the wine an underground cachet. So the next year he just had the lables printed with the black dash. This was great till Taylor wines sued him again, and arguning before the same judge, won the case that the black mark had become identified with "taylor".
So the next year he left off the black mark and instead just put oil paintings of his deceased relatives on the bottles with the captions, joe TAYLOR. mary TAYLOR, etc....
Taylor wines sued him again. So he once again he erased the name and left the pictures that every one now recognized as the taylor family portraits. .
Taylor sued again and won. He was ordered to turn over the lables so he loaded them in the manure spreader and spread them around taylor wines office building.
Finally he altered all the portraits to cyclopses and dared them to say he was related. Around then he also adopted the name "bully hill winery". ANd there it ended.
I'd say lindash should just use a strategically placed Star or fig leaf to cover the last part of its name.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
C#.
:-)
Seriously, how the hell are you going to market that?
This reminds me of the case study done on white wines. Turns out that approx 75% of white wine drinkers prefer Gewertztraminer to Chardonnay grapes. Yet Chardonnay is still the top white grape in the world. Why? Because people can't pronounce Gewurtztraminer (Guh-vurtz-trah-mihn-er), and don't want to sound stupid.
Good luck with that dash thing, folks. Let me know how it works out for you.
What does it mean to wake out of a dream
and be wearing someone else's shorts?
BNL, Born on a Pirate Ship (1998)
In dutch: "Beveelt Lindows.com om binnen acht dagen na betekening van dit vonnis de toegang voor de website(s) van Lindows.com waarop zij programmatuur aanbiedt onder de naam "Lindows", "Lindows.com", en "LindowsOS", inclusief maar niet beperkt tot de website op URL http://www.lindows.com, ontoegankelijk te maken voor bezoekers uit Belgie, Nederland en Luxemburg." , which roughly translates to:
"(The court) Orders a verdict under which Lindows.com is to block access to the website of Lindows.com where she offers software under the name of "Lindows", including but not limited to the website at URL http://www.lindows.com, to all vistors from Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxembourg."
I can still access it, even though I'm from Holland, but I feel I still have the right to get the Lindows product from Lindows.com as I please.
This view of the "Internet", and the websites that it houses is quite stalinistic in my humble opinion.
Slashdot: stuff for news, nerds that matter, matter for news, stuff that nerd
Trademark, not copyright, but you're correct.
All they want is the name changed, they're not trying to stop them from selling it.
Yes, it's a stupid name, however what I think many people here are overlooking is this statement from Michael Robertson:
"Any action from Microsoft to block Lin---s will show their true intentions are not to protect their trademark, but to eliminate competition and maintain their monopoly."
Basically he's bear baiting.
...you don't let engineers do your marketing.
from their news release on the topic ...
Copyright (C) 2004 Lindows.com, Inc. All rights reserved.
Lindows.com is not endorsed by or affiliated with Microsoft Corporation in any way - in fact, we don't even really like them because they are suing us.
vodka, straight up, thank you!
-
Sponsoring several open source projects:
-
kde-look.org
- kde-apps.org
-
Mozilla
-
Nvu
-
gaim
-
And the list goes on
...
-
Hiring Everaldo
Yeah, let's hope they go belly up. Now, who is the baby ?This is infantile. If you are being forced to change your name, just do it.
No, this pokes fun at MS's insanity.
This seems completely asinine. How many hundreds of products out there call themselves "win"foo, or foo"indows"-bar? Yet who does MS go after? a Linux company.
Microsoft arguably has to protect their trademarks to keep them valid, but the existance of exactly the examples I gave demonstrate that they have already given up their trademark. And that doesn't even take into consideration the outright absurdity of trying to consider a common English word as a trademark in the first place.
So, a jab at MS? Yup. Infantile? Hey, personally I would have gone even further, changing it to something like "Nanosuck Lindoors YQ", with a slogan like "what it takes them a millionth of a second to do, we do in a billionth", or "Bo and Luke may have used windows, but the rest of us prefer doors", or "A full letter ahead of the competition" (okay, those all sound really stupid, but you get the idea - Push the limits of trademarkability to their idiotic extremes).
Earlier today, I thouht the EU came down a bit hard on MS, rejecting the very settlement they (the EU) themselves had proposed. But now? Crap like this makes me long for the revocation of a company's (not just MS's) corporate charter. If they can't all play nice, take 'em out back and put 'em all against the wall.
Many years ago, Apple was developing a new computer under the code name "Carl Sagan". Well, Carl Sagan learned of this and had his lawyers send a C&D letter to Apple. So Apple changed the code name to "Butt-Head Astronomer". A few details are here.
Maybe Lindows should be named Butt-Head CEO?- "Windows" is a generic term that cannot be trademarked.
- Microsoft only has a trademark on "Microsoft Windows."
Thus, I must conclude that it's perfectly acceptable for anyone to use the term "Windows." By extension, if "Windows" itself is OK, then something that is similar is also OK (i.e. "Lindows" or "Lindows Windows").What wouldn't be OK is something like, "Microsoft Lindows" or "Microsoft Windowsish OS" or "Lindows Microsoft Windows".
Side note: It occurs to me that "Linux" has been trademarked by Linus. I think he has more (not much more) of a case against the Lindows company than Microsoft does.
It's a self-fufilling prophecy. When google gets it in it's database from slashdot, it will then exist :)
Lindows isn't stupid and there is nothing to get away with in the US. All Lindows has to prove is that, at the time Microsoft decided to name its OS Windows, that the term windows was a generic term for all GUIs. The jury will not have to consider whether or not consumers will currently be confused, because that's not the issue.
Lindows will certainly win their case against Microsoft.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Just say it like Homer: Lin-DOH!
(Does Fox have a trademark on "DOH"?)
One man's -1 Flamebait is another man's +5 Funny.
Since we studied this in a law class last semester:
For a company to win in a trademark case, the biggest factor is showing that the allegedly infringing trademark is likely to cause confusion in a normal consumer. So it doesn't have to be precisely the same or anything, it just has to be to the point that your normal consumer might get confused by it, and hence you'd have your bussiness hurt.
That's why if it is two totally different products, there's usually not a problem. No one is going to mistake software called Firebird for the car called Firebird, two totally different thigns. However Windows and Lindows were both OSes, and Lindows selling point is being like Windows (similar interface, alleged compatibility, always root, etc).
That's probably why MS had a fairly strong case, since it seemed reasonable that a normal consumer would get confused. I think that is a reasonable statement, a non-savvy user could easily buy a Lindows machine believing it to the same as Windows.
The statements made by the developers of Lindows don't help either. As memory serves, they were touting it as a Windows replacement, and actually had to back down on some claims because they couldn't get compatibility as good as they thought. That sort of thing is factored in.