[copyleft-next] copyleft-next 0.2.0 released

Richard Fontana fontana at sharpeleven.org
Thu Feb 21 15:23:21 UTC 2013


On Thu, Feb 21, 2013 at 09:07:50AM -0500, Pamela Chestek wrote:
> 
>     > * "or "powered by" statements"
>     >
>     > Is this too specific, or are we hoping a judge would understand this as
>     > referring to a class of statements? E.g. if there was a "FooBar Inside"
>     > statement instead of "Powered by FooBar"...
> 
>     This is just a clarification of what kinds of things absolutely are
>     not 'Legal Notices'. It isn't meant to be exhaustive, but I did
>     recently add 'Powered by statements' because that is such a common
>     form in which I've seen the problematic condition.
> 
> 
> When Gerv raised this, I wondered why the word "trademarks" isn't in there.
> When I suggested adding "trademark legends" I'm SURE I had a good reason not to
> add "trademarks," but for the life of me I can't figure it out now. Maybe I was
> thinking about the case where a name is also a trademark, so in the copyright
> notice the company name would also be trademark? But that seems a silly thing
> to worry might get misinterpreted.

I believe something like that had occurred to me.  *Maybe* it would be
silly, but based on past experience I can anticipate *some* critical
readers saying that there's a contradiction (or, worse, a trap)
because you have to preserve copyright notices.

That said, if you'd used 'trademarks or trademark legends' in your
version I suspect I would have used that.

> So if no one else can think of a good reason not to say "trademark," doesn't it
> make sense to say "but does not include logos, other graphical images,
> _trademarks or_ trademark legends[, or "powered by" statements]." That will
> take care of all the "powered by," "built on," "inside" statements.

It's a good solution, apart from the concern noted above.

 - RF



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