[CentOS] Send in your favorite CentOS slogan today

[Dag Wieers]

On Mon, 3 Mar 2008, Matt Shields wrote:

> On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 11:36 AM, Dan Carl <danc at bluestarshows.com> wrote:
>> Heard someone mention free beer, had to participate.
>>
>>  CentOS, we find RedHat's bugs
>>
>>  CentOS, the OS that makes sense.
>
> I know that everyone seems to think any mention of RH is cute and
> funny, but it's just asking for a lawsuit.  Does anyone remember
> LinuxWorld Expo in Boston a couple years ago when RH was releasing
> RHEL4.  No?  I do, because that's when CentOS got a letter from RH
> legal department asking to remove all references to their name and I
> was the one sitting in the LinuxWorld booth trying to justify to
> people that CentOS was a valid project and not just stealing someone
> else's IP.  If CentOS wants to be taken seriously, especially by big
> business, you don't do it by biting the hand that feeds you and
> creating bad publicity.  Referring to RH without their permission is
> just begging for RH to sue us.  Drop the RH jokes and push CentOS on
> it's merit as a stable enterprise OS with a great community behind it.
>
> Also without RH, CentOS wouldn't be.  They make it very easy to obtain
> the sources in a manner that makes it easy to build CentOS by
> releasing complete SRPMs.  There's nothing saying RH has to release
> the code this way.  They could make it very difficult for groups like
> CentOS, WhiteBox, and Scientific Linux. Be nice to RH and buy a
> license here and there when it makes sense.  They have their place in
> the food chain, as do we.

The situation is not as black-and-white as portrayed here. Of course 
CentOS can only exist because of Red Hat. That is in fact the whole idea 
behind CentOS.

But it makes no sense that CentOS cannot tell what it is (read: identity 
crisis), even not reference Red Hat. Even Microsoft or Novell can mention 
Red Hat, so why can't CentOS ?

I doubt there is a legal basis for what people read into Red Hat's letter. 
Anyone can refer to Red Hat as long as they do not imply they _are_ Red 
Hat, or are endorsed by Red Hat.

If CentOS would state that:

 	CentOS is compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

You imply that:

 	1. You are *not* Red Hat Enterprise Linux
 	2. You are not Red Hat.

If CentOS would state that:

 	CentOS is a rebuild of Red Hat Enterprise Linux sources.

You imply that;

 	1. You are *not* Red Hat Enterprise Linux
 	2. You are not Red Hat

Even if we would add that:

 	CentOS is not Red Hat and is not endorsed by Red Hat
or even
 	Red Hat Enterprise Linux is a trademark owned by Red Hat

and put at (TM) sign on top, is all fine and legally dandy and we should 
not fear any legal repercusion. What is more, CentOS is actually enlarging 
the Red Hat community, is offering nice additional packages and 
fuctionality on top of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and CentOS allows people 
to learn and use RHEL without having to purchase it (think of IT 
consultants and students/schools).

I am the first person to encourage companies to buy licenses for 
everything that requires support and is business/mission critical. But 
this whole 'we cannot reference Red Hat because of legal difficulties or 
because of gratitude' is not helping CentOS at all. And therefor it is not 
helping Red Hat either.

CentOS is not in competition with Red Hat and Red Hat would not have 
existed without the Open Source community at large either. There is no 
need for eternal gratitude or eternal loyalty.

Thank you very much :)
-- 
--   dag wieers,  dag at centos.org,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[Any errors in spelling, tact or fact are transmission errors]