What a nonsense issue. This superfluous discussion is fueled by two fallacies, the confusion of copyright and trademarking and an unhealthy paranoia toward the foundation. Protection of logos associated with the wikimedia community is a good thing. The foundation is an asset to the community! They can offer legal support in cases of abuse of wikimedia related symbology. It is absurd to create a spectre of a community-suing evil foundation while at the same tie ignoring the very real threat of dilution and abuse of wikimedia symbols and resulting damage of wikimedia community reputation by spam, phishing, link farming etc. sites. Sorry, but this is alarmist hippie crap and typical "netizen-outrage".
On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 7:20 AM, Federico Leva (Nemo) <nemow...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > -------- Messaggio originale -------- > Oggetto: [Wikimedia-l] Free as in Wikimedia Foundation > Data: Tue, 19 Mar 2013 13:12:04 +0100 > Mittente: Tomasz W. Kozłowski > A: Wikimedia Mailing List > > Hi community, > I would like to bring to your attention a matter that's currently > being discussed on Meta, one that has not yet gained too much interest > (though it was discussed during IRC office hours, and was mentioned on > one mailing list, as far as I see). > > It seems that the Wikimedia Foundation registered a community logo > <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wikimedia_Community_Logo.svg> as > a trademark in the United States, with the international application > still pending. > > The logo was originally created in 2006 by User:WarX (Artur > Fijałkowski) , and was adopted as the logo of Meta-Wiki in 2008 — and > as far as I can recall, the very point of it being created was to (1) > have a community logo released into the public domain and (2) to have > a community logo which was /not a trademark/. > > I am especially worried about the WMF not informing the community > about their trademark registration — we have only found out about it > via an edit on Commons > <https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?diff=84864201&oldid=49625546>, > and then after asking about it during IRC office hours at the end of > January. > > As far as I understand, the WMF has not discussed trademark > registration with the author of the logo > <https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?diff=92395329&oldid=92392542> > — though obviously, since Artur-WarX released it into the public > domain, it would've only be good manners, and not a legal requirement. > > The discussion is taking place on Meta at > <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Logo>, and all > comments are welcome. > > -- > Tomasz W. Kozłowski > a.k.a. [[user:odder]] > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list > wikimedi...@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l > > _______________________________________________ > Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l > Posting guidelines for this list: > https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette _______________________________________________ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
