Australian Linux Trademark Holds Water

Seft writes "The Inquirer is running a story in response to the recent Linux trademark news in Australia which was previously covered on Slashdot. The story was dismissed as a hoax by many, but now it seems that Linus Torvalds is dead serious." John 'Maddog' Hall stated for the article that the move was not about getting a slice of anyone's action but purely to protect the quality of products that utilize the Linux name.

Comments

How does this protect quality

[mwvdlee]

John 'Maddog' Hall stated for the article that the move was not about getting a slice of anyone's action but purely to protect the quality of products that utilize the Linux name.

So how does paying money to some random entity protect quality? Why can't they just hand out trademark licenses for free to good Linux companies? I know they have expenses, but that still doesn't justify requiring payment for something which essentially belongs to the public.

Re:Jeremy Malcolm was unfairly mobbed...

[Anonymous Coward]

Where I work we were pretty taken aback by this, we have about 20 linux webservers running various apps, but after a budget meeting we've decided that for a paultry 100k we can move our site to bsd over the next few months.

Its very important that businesses watch this stuff closely over the next few years, especially with the gpl 3 coming down the pike it would be wise to get off of linux and save your company from lawsuits. Even Microsoft products will be more predictible when producing budgets. Linux is becoming an intellectual property trap.

What is in a name?

[adtifyj]

I say absolute bollocks to anyone who tries to justify trademarking the name Linux. IMO even Linus does not have a claim to the name, as it was others that named it, so its inception is a play on the trademark UNIX coupled with the original authors name. Besides that, he has not protected the term, and IIRC he stated that he would not do this. (Anyone remember the details?)

So why the change of tune? Because the name is so valuable? There is plenty of case history to indicate that a company can not cash in on a term that has become popular, and has fallen into general use. Why the double standards when it comes to Linux? Because something bad could be associated with Linux? I would prefer to see the name Linux used out of context, thank you very much. Something rotten is happening right now; expect more of the same to come if this is not reversed.

I am sure that many of us felt that Linux was not able to be owned by any one person; now it is, and fee's are being charged. The sad part about this is that it will reduce the expectation that companies need to be part of the community; instead they will pay their dues and expect the developers to jump when they have a problem.

Paying SCO $699 sounds like the better option in hindsight.

I know its not that simple, but I expected the resolution of the trademark dispute to mean that it was now in good hands, and that they would either let it slip into the public domain to avoid the problem re-occuring, or would fight the most obvious of infringements with the full backing of the community.

(UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group).