First a minor remark on languages spoken in Finland:
About 95% of people living in Finland speak Finnish as their first language; around 5% speak Swedish (including Linus Torvalds). The majority of Swedish speaking people are not emmigrants from Sweden, but rather Finns who adopted Swedish language in the years of Swedish rule, when it was the only official language. Swedish spoken in Finland is quite different from the variant spoken in Sweden; also most Swedish speaking Finns speak Finnish rather well, excluding those living in Ahvenanmaa/Aland autonymous area. I think there are around 50,000 Sami speaking Lapps in Finland, which is ~1% of the total population of ~5 million. I have read (don't remember the source) that Russian has recently passed Sami as the third most popular language in Finland. In Helsinki, where I live, Russian is a langage you hear spoken every day. Also, English is teached in Finnish schools to everyone, and most people speak it quite well. One of the reasons for this is the extensive usage of subtitles (rather than dubbing) in Finnish television.
Now back to the main topic. It is true that a direct translatation of the word "windows" would be something like "ikkunat" or "ikkunoita" in Finnish; some computer magazine tried ~10 years ago to coin a term "ikkunointiymparisto" for graphical desktop environment, but it didn't become popular. However, is I have pointed out, English language is much used in Finland, in particular in trademarks and product names. As most people understand English well, I don't see any reason why argument against trademark doesn't hold in Finland as well. I suppose one can't trademark Chinese characters in Finland (or in USA)?
In general, there are quite strict rules, what is an acceptable trademark for a Finnish company. For example, you may not trademark a persons name, if it is not your own name. For some reason those rules are seldom applied to large foreign companies.
From outside, Finland may seem to be an advanced and liberal society, but Finnish political and juridical system has long traditions of behaving like vassals of Big Business, Soviet Union or whatever power that looks mighty and frightening at the moment. Finland was among the most vocal advocates in EU for software patents, for example. Basically, what comes to IP issues, the laws in Finland are made in Redmond rather than in Helsinki. This kind of spineless slave mentality makes me feel truly sorry for my country.
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First a minor remark on languages spoken in Finland: About 95% of people living in Finland speak Finnish as their first language; around 5% speak Swedish (including Linus Torvalds). The majority of Swedish speaking people are not emmigrants from Sweden, but rather Finns who adopted Swedish language in the years of Swedish rule, when it was the only official language. Swedish spoken in Finland is quite different from the variant spoken in Sweden; also most Swedish speaking Finns speak Finnish rather well, excluding those living in Ahvenanmaa/Aland autonymous area. I think there are around 50,000 Sami speaking Lapps in Finland, which is ~1% of the total population of ~5 million. I have read (don't remember the source) that Russian has recently passed Sami as the third most popular language in Finland. In Helsinki, where I live, Russian is a langage you hear spoken every day. Also, English is teached in Finnish schools to everyone, and most people speak it quite well. One of the reasons for this is the extensive usage of subtitles (rather than dubbing) in Finnish television. Now back to the main topic. It is true that a direct translatation of the word "windows" would be something like "ikkunat" or "ikkunoita" in Finnish; some computer magazine tried ~10 years ago to coin a term "ikkunointiymparisto" for graphical desktop environment, but it didn't become popular. However, is I have pointed out, English language is much used in Finland, in particular in trademarks and product names. As most people understand English well, I don't see any reason why argument against trademark doesn't hold in Finland as well. I suppose one can't trademark Chinese characters in Finland (or in USA)? In general, there are quite strict rules, what is an acceptable trademark for a Finnish company. For example, you may not trademark a persons name, if it is not your own name. For some reason those rules are seldom applied to large foreign companies.
From outside, Finland may seem to be an advanced and liberal society, but Finnish political and juridical system has long traditions of behaving like vassals of Big Business, Soviet Union or whatever power that looks mighty and frightening at the moment. Finland was among the most vocal advocates in EU for software patents, for example. Basically, what comes to IP issues, the laws in Finland are made in Redmond rather than in Helsinki. This kind of spineless slave mentality makes me feel truly sorry for my country.