Hi, I apologize for breaking the thread as my Fedora mail is a bit broken ATM...
David Nalley david at gnsa.us > Wed Jul 20 01:41:02 UTC 2011 >
2011/7/19 Máirín Duffy <duffy at fedoraproject.org>: > >. As outlined in the guidelines, you are supposed to request > permission for > > your particular usage of the logo in writing to logo at > fedoraproject.org. > > The above seems to conflict with my understanding of the trademark > guidelines from: > http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Legal:Trademark_guidelines >
So this is a good point. I am not a lawyer nor any kind of legal expert, and I do not think this is the correct place to discuss the particulars of Fedora's trademark guidelines and we'd probably all be better served if I hadn't said anything in the first place and had just redirected to Fedora legal.
Please insert, 'if not explicitly granted by the trademark guidelines' to the end of the quoted sentence to understand my intent.
The point that Christoph made was: "Somebody could just violate the guidelines and declare it a sublogo."
The point I was trying to make to allay this concern is that following the guidelines on the Logo/Usage Guidelines page does not automagically grant you trademark rights. The trademark guidelines page does *in some situations* but there are many situations in which it does not. So you can't make a Fedora Hot Dog Haters logo using the sublogo guidelines and be okay. The 'Fedora Hot Dog Haters' example given is not explicitly granted in the trademark guidelines wiki page. Here is some language that could support this claim, with varying levels of hilarity:
- "the use is only in connection with promoting the Fedora Project or Fedora products" I don't understand how a group of people sharing stories of hate about hot dogs promotes the Fedora project or 'products.'
- "the use is not disparaging to Red Hat, the Fedora Project or their products" - the hot dog is an unofficial meat product of Fedora and having a haters group is disparaging to it
- "the official logo usage guidelines are strictly observed" - the official logo guidelines state that the groups sublogo is meant for usage by groups within Fedora, and the applications logo is for use for applications running on Fedora's infrastructure. If your application isn't running on Fedora's infrastructure, you can't use that sublogo. You could feasibly consider a hot dog haters group a 'group' within Fedora as it is not an official Fedora SIG or team. I suppose if such a group went through the SIG creation process such a logo might fly. I do not know if we have a canonical group of SIGs/teams within Fedora, but my guess is the list of groups in FAS would be a good start at one. Certainly if no such group exists you have no business creating such a logo.
We could modify the language in the logo usage guidelines to explicitly state you must be creating a logo for an established SIG or team within Fedora if you use the 'groups' sublogo. Would that help?
Specifically, there are a number of situations which do not require permission to use Fedora®, the Fedora word design, the Infinity design logo, Fedora Remix, and the Fedora Remix word design, either separately or in combination.
Yep and as stated above there are a number of situation that do.
Am I misunderstanding the intent of what's meant by request
permission > for a particular usage of the logo? > I fear that if permission from logo at fp.o is required above and > beyond > the levels established at the trademark guidelines, I've frequently > run afoul of that requirement. For instance, the logo that appears at: > http://www.southeastlinuxfest.org/sponsor/fedora likely originated > from me (although derived from the svgs) in years past, and fwiu, > falls within the Trademark Guidelines no-permission-necessary section,
but I don't recall asking permission for it.
Christoph and I were specifically talking about *modifying* the marks. E.g., if you take a sublogo design where the name of the application is meant to be filled in something like:
() fedora BUILDSYSTEM
() fedora UPDATE SYSTEM
and do something like this to it:
() fedora HANKY THE HOTDOG
You're taking a trademarked mark and combining it with 'hanky the hotdog', who has little to do with Fedora.
So just to restate another way: if you take unmodified (besides say colorspace and size) logomarks such as the Fedora full logo, the logo mark, the logo text, or any of the four foundations graphics, and use them in a manner explicitly approved by the trademark guidelines you are fine. There is no question your usage of the Fedora logo was fine. Where it gets hairy is if you decide to take the FUDcon logo and make a
% fudcon HANKY'S BASEMENT
logo out of it, following the aesthetic guidelines but getting Hanky's basement involved when there is nor ever will be an official 'FUDcon Hanky's basement' event.
To more succinctly state my question: If I comply with the Trademark guidelines (either through one of the no-permission-needed
exceptions, > or with an explicit agreement) and I use the trademark(s) in > accordance with the usage guidelines wrt colors, spacing, etc., what > additional permission is needed?
Great question. If you are filling in a 'template' logo there are some additional requirements:
- If you are using the 'FUDcon' logo template, you may only fill in the template with the location of an actual FUDcon. While we may like a FUDcon Aruba, if it's not a real event, you shouldn't be making a logo for it.
- If you are using the Fedora sublogo for applications, you should only fill in the template with the name of an application that actually exists and is hosted on Fedora's infrastructure.
- If you are using the Fedora sublogo for groups, you should only fill in the template with the name of a Fedora SIG or team that actually exists.
Anyway, I am not comfortable having this discussion on this list and would like to request again that anyone concerned here take their concerns to the Fedora Board or to Fedora legal. Thanks in advance, I very much appreciate it.
Hope the above helps.
Cheers, ~m
design-team@lists.fedoraproject.org
-
Máirín Duffy