On Wed, 2005-08-24 at 01:02 -0500, Mike McCarty wrote: > Umm. Before the trademark, yes. Not after. Then this entire thread has been a useless discussion. I know the point you were trying to make on source code, but it's not an option. Someone _can_ run "strings" on your binaries and possibly see a trademark. In fact, that's how many people using GPL licensed code not under the terms of the GPL get caught by their copyright holders. If it's a publicly known name and distributed under the GPL, then it has very different rules on what trademark protections are allowed compared to something non-GPL. I've tried to cover those, and I think this point is very much moot given the fact that you _did_ use the trademark publicly. > Company A used names for the software and hardware it developed for > more than 20 years. By an oversight, it did not trademark those names. There is a case of "prior art/use" if it had been for 20 years. > They did have a some sort of agreement that Company A had some time > to remove the use of Company B's trademark from all literature, > source code, etc, and that Company B would not pursue Company A > legally during the "grace period", in order that Company A could > continue doing business w/o being stopped dead in its tracks. Then there was some agreements in effect. Company A should have sought other counsel, possibly litigation. > (This is the "official" version. Many at Company A considered > that Company B knew about Company A's products and names, and > deliberately abused the oversight to "steal" the goodwill and > reputation associated with those names by trademarking them. > I'm giving everyone the benefit of the doubt in my recounting. > Certainly, Company A was well-known, and its products had > a fine reputation at the time.) Again, blame your poor counsel. -- Bryan J. Smith b.j.smith at ieee.org http://thebs413.blogspot.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The best things in life are NOT free - which is why life is easiest if you save all the bills until you can share them with the perfect woman