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eCos Trademark Usage
- From: Alex Schuilenburg <alexs at ecoscentric dot com>
- To: eCos Discussion <ecos-discuss at ecos dot sourceware dot org>, ecos-announce at ecos dot sourceware dot org
- Date: Tue, 11 Mar 2008 17:01:10 +0000
- Subject: eCos Trademark Usage
- Reply-to: eCos Discussion <ecos-discuss at ecos dot sourceware dot org>
Dear All
I would like to notify you of the eCos Trademark Policy and FAQ
published at:
http://www.ecoscentric.com/trademark_usage.shtml
Why is eCosCentric enforcing the eCos trademark?
Trademark law ensures that a operating system calling itself eCos really
is eCos, by which we mean the source of the operating system was from
the recognised free public distribution of eCos
[http://ecos.sourceware.org]. eCosCentric is enforcing the eCos
trademark to prevent any one party from duping the marketplace into
believing that the eCos it is providing actually came from the
recognised free public distribution of eCos when it did not. Trademarks
are important because they help to prevent confusion in the marketplace
by distinguishing the source of a product, in this case eCos. Should
eCosCentric elect not to enforce the trademark and logo, these can fall
into common use and thereby become difficult to defend should a party
decide to use these to describe an operating system that is not derived
from the recognised free public distribution of eCos.
It is important for the eCos community that the trademark is both
acknowledged and respected in order to be able to properly protect eCos.
While the FSF protects the copyright and code base of eCos, the mark
must be actively used in trade in order to be recognised and defensible.
As eCosCentric are better placed than the FSF for this role, we acquired
the trademark from the FSF shortly after it was donated to the FSF by
Red Hat.
In order to properly define the parameters for the community and fair
use of the trademark, eCosCentric created a trademark usage policy and
guidelines based on the former guidelines of Red Hat, and incorporated
parts of the Linux policy and guidelines from the Linux Mark Institute
[http://www.linuxmark.org/]. We believe this policy allows the mark to
be used freely by the eCos Community in a non-commercial environment
while still being able to protect the mark.
As it has come to our attention that some community projects and
commercial organisations are not abiding by the guidelines, we would
also like to draw these guidelines to the attention of these bodies and
ask them to please review their use of the trademark and comply with the
guidelines. Proper use of the eCos trademark not only will help protect
eCos and the eCos community, but will also help protect your project and
business. After all, most of us want to keep eCos as the #1 Free Open
Source RTOS.
Thanks for your support
-- Alex Schuilenburg
Managing Director/CEO eCosCentric Limited
Tel: +44 1223 245571 Barnwell House, Barnwell Drive
Fax: +44 1223 248712 Cambridge, CB5 8UU, UK
www.ecoscentric.com Reg in England and Wales, Reg No 4422071
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