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From: frank@fwi.uva.nl (Frank van der Linden)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.misc
Subject: Re: What is "BSD"?
Date: 24 Aug 1995 16:34:40 +0200
Organization: FWI, University of Amsterdam
Lines: 39
Distribution: world
Message-ID: <41i2m0$7bg@carol.fwi.uva.nl>
References: <CGD.95Aug20032937@BALVENIE.PDL.CS.CMU.EDU> <4199pv$skk@cnn.nas.nasa.gov> <41adgc$b0m@bsdi.BSDI.COM> <DDo9z9.JFC@kithrup.com> <VIXIE.95Aug21180823@wisdom.home.vix.com> <KSTAILEY.95Aug23084007@leidecker.gsfc.nasa.gov> <VIXIE.95Aug23111011@gw.vix.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: carol.fwi.uva.nl
vixie@gw.vix.com (Paul A Vixie) writes:
>All indications are that NetBSD could have its trademark. Nobody wants
>to call their system "BSD" now that CSRG is dead; not even BSDi uses
>that for a product name (they use BSD/OS, for the record.) So, what harm?
"It feels wrong". Yep, that's something that probably doesn't count in
the real world, I know. BSDI have taken a name that is not theirs. They
did not invent the name "BSD" (even though they have Mike Karels with them,
who has worked on the 'real' BSD for a long time, and Chris Torek). Yet
they have claimed it. The 'right' thing to do to me here seems that BSDI
had contacted UCB, saying "You know, you really ought to trademark the
name 'BSD', so that everyone doesn't run away with it, it would help us too".
That seems like a pretty naive thought, I guess. I'm probably not a good
businessman (and much less a lawyer, but hey, I am proud of that ;-))
So, harm done? Not yet, and I certainly hope that none will be done. If
BSDI is just going to enforce it's trademark in the way they do now
now things might be ok (I don't know what the actual text of the agreement
says). But you never know, peoples attitudes may change, or BSDI gets into
financial trouble, another company takes over and decides to enforce the
trademark in a much more strict way (don't get me wrong, I am not saying
that this is going to happen, much less that I want it to happen, but
am just giving a worse case scenario here).
What seems strange to me is, that this enforcement comes after BSDI
already had the trademark for a while. The reasons Rob Kolstad gave were of
concern about, say, a year ago too. So why start enforcing it now?
Oh well. As long as people can keep on doing with the BSD code what they
want to (make money from it, experiment with it, just use it, or..
fight about it ;-))
- Frank
--
Frank van der Linden, frank@fwi.uva.nl
Use NetBSD, it's Unix, it's free and works on:
i386+, Mac, Amiga, HP300, Sun3, Sun4c, PC532, DEC Alpha, DEC MIPS
Work in progress: Vax, Atari and a host of others