To expand and clarify on Mark's excellent points: Mark Thomas <ma...@apache.org> wrote earlier: > On 2016-09-06 17:06 (+0100), Simos Xenitellis > <simos.li...@googlemail.com> wrote: > > Just responding to these specific bits with my Apache Brand > Management Committee member hat on. > >> which claims that the Apache Foundation has the Apache >> OpenOffice and OpenOffice.org®. However, my search at the US >> Trademark database does not show an "Apache OpenOffice" registered >> trademark. > > Which is as expected. Note the TM. That denotes that "Apache > OpenOffice" is a trademark, just not a registered one. It is a gross > simplification but, for the ASF, it makes little/no difference to our > rights whether it is registered or not. Registration does make it > easier to enforce compliance should the trademark be infringed.
The ASF's use of "Apache OpenOffice" and similar names to provide our office suite software to the public over the past few years gives us a clear common law right to those trademarks, whether registered in various jurisdictions or not. Note that through our own efforts and from inheriting the prior trademark owner's registrations, the ASF holds registrations for OPENOFFICE in Canada, Switzerland, and other countries, and for OPENOFFICE.ORG and/or the gull design in the US, EU, India, and a wide variety of other countries. The ASF has registered APACHE separately, so it is a registered trademark, although the whole phrase is not yet registered. > >> It does show a live trademark for the old "OpenOffice.org" and >> also for "LibreOffice" (for The Document Foundation). But no >> "Apache OpenOffice". Anyone can file for a trademark for "Apache >> OpenOffice", as they have done already with the domain >> "ApacheOpenOffice.org". > > If someone other than the ASF tried to register "Apache OpenOffice" > as a trademark we would oppose that registration and I am very > confident we would be successful. Indeed, while it depends on the jurisdiction, any third party attempt to register that name in the US would clearly be refused due to likelihood of confusion with our existing mark(s). > > Domain registration is not trademark registration. This. Domains and trademarks are wholly separate areas of law, with trademarks being the far more complex (and costly) area. For end user office application software, our rights for the name are well established internationally. > > The registration of ApacheOpenOffice.org looks to be abusive. The > Apache OpenOffice PMC has some options for dealing with that. How > they wish to proceed is a decision for them. Note that such issues > are generally dealt with in private, not public, so you are unlikely > to see a discussion about what to do about this specific issue on a > public ASF mailing list. Yes, I look to the PMC to resolve this on private@; it's likely if we can't solve it politely the ASF would file a UDRP to remove it. - Shane > > Mark --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@openoffice.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@openoffice.apache.org
