, as someone once caught up in a trademark legal bluff, I can ...

2026-09-30T17:48:36Z

In reply to nevent1q…85up
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, as someone once caught up in a trademark legal bluff, I can say: said body of law is frequently misunderstood -- but security researcher Joshua Michael seems to have grasped the important bits admirably, and won't be an easy takedown -- or intimidation -- target.

When online magazine Linux Gazette received bogus trademark threats from our former sponsor, SSC, Inc., one of my first and most important suggestions to our editor-in-chief is that he append to all monthly issues, including back issues, a notice that "Linux Gazette is not produced or endorsed by our former host, SSC, Inc." (which was immediately done).

Why? Because that edit eviscerated SSC's claim of trademark infringement at its core: Infringement occurs if a trademark owner's least perceptive customers (the dumbasses) are confused into thinking a competing product or service is that of the trademark owner. It's a limited monopoly on brand impression.

And, point is, researcher Michael already implemented exactly such a notice, as a pop-up.

Additionally, his mention of Flock Safety's name is clearly nominative, used solely for identification -- the legal theory by which PepsiCo may lawfully say "You should drink our sugar water instead of Coca-Cola's, because it's better."

There's more bluffing inherent in trademark enforcement than in basically any other law-adjacent area, for reasons Cory Doctorow (npub1fdr…lvhs) once explained here: https://web.archive.org/web/20171115092225/http://www.openp2p.com/pub/a/p2p/2003/08/14/trademarks.html

(The Linux Gazette face-off was long ago, and the magazine has ceased publication, but we successfully called SSC's bluff, and they slunk away with nothing.)

I sighed at Cory's coinage, the outreach obstacles It creates ...

2024-08-21T23:57:07Z

In reply to nevent1q…e657
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I sighed at Cory's coinage, the outreach obstacles It creates being severe and woeful. The best I've been able to do (so far) is to dub his observation "Doctorow's Law of Platforms", add its primordial wording to my Lexicon page, and cite that by URL without Cory's problematic word.

http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/lexicon.html#doctorow

Nostr notes by Rick Moen 🇺🇸 🇳🇴 🇬🇧

, as someone once caught up in a trademark legal bluff, I can ...

I sighed at Cory's coinage, the outreach obstacles It creates ...