what to do about annoying trademark use?

[Daniel Golle]

On Mon, Nov 02, 2020 at 06:49:39AM -0500, Rich Brown wrote:
> A couple thoughts:
> 
> TL;DR - I'm not clear that we have a problem of NXP misusing the OpenWrt name. (But I woke up early since we just switched from DST, and my Google-fu may be weak...)
> 
> In any event, we should "be nice" if we need to ask for changes. Details... 
> 
> 1) I googled for "NXP Layerscape OpenWrt 20.09" from Daniel Golle's note, but didn't find anything relevant. I did find a "QorIQ LS1043A" fact sheet at https://www.nxp.com/docs/en/fact-sheet/LS1043A46ABHRFS.pdf that clearly states that "Linux OpenWRT" runs on it. That usage seems to be explicitly in-bounds. I also found a bunch of "Community" items that talk about porting OpenWrt to a NXP device. In fact, we have an entry in the Table of Hardware at https://openwrt.org/toh/hwdata/nxp/nxp_ls1046ardb

I've been alerted by

https://github.com/openwrt/openwrt/pull/3521

linking

https://source.codeaurora.org/external/qoriq/qoriq-components/openwrt/


This strongly reminded me of stuff like that:

https://github.com/openwrt/luci/issues/4557

which we encounter (also in less obvious and hence more time-consuming
variations) on a dialy basis.


> 
> 2) It's good to have the SFC available to do the heavy lifting if we need to speak formally with NXP.

I strongly hope that won't be needed.

> 
> 3) I want to second Daniel's concern that we not be jerks. I am reminded of Netflix's good job when asking someone not to use their "Stranger Things" name... https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20170920/09481438248/what-netflixs-congenial-trademark-threat-letter-says-about-everyones-tolerance-trademark-bullying.shtml

The kind of action I had in mind was more like writing better
documentation or some kind of manual on how to fork OpenWrt in a
repectful or at least non-harmful way.

> 
> Rich
> 
> > On Nov 1, 2020, at 2:15 PM, Fernando Frediani <fhfrediani at gmail.com> wrote:
> > 
> > +1 for Sam's suggestion.
> > Makes sense and sounds pretty reasonable.
> > 
> > Fernando
> > 
> > On 01/11/2020 15:42, Sam Kuper wrote:
> >> On Sun, Nov 01, 2020 at 02:29:48AM +0000, Daniel Golle wrote:
> >>> So NXP has released something they call NXP Layerscape OpenWrt 20.09
> >>> 
> >>> So not only they use the OpenWrt brand name, they have also released
> >>> their fork with a version which looks like it could be an official
> >>> OpenWrt release and will make people think that they should annoy us
> >>> when it comes to getting support for that.
> >>> 
> >>> I'm not suggesting to do anything about that in terms of legal action
> >>> (as that would be even more annoying for everyone involved), but I
> >>> think we should do something to prevent that from happening even more
> >>> in future.
> >>> 
> >>> We are closing bug reports (especially for LuCI) on dialy basis where
> >>> people request support for software which looks like it was an OpenWrt
> >>> release but turns out to be a vendor-fork.
> >>> 
> >>> Debian also managed to make vendors name their forks differently, ie.
> >>> Raspbian and such. ASUSWrt is kind of a good example of how it would
> >>> be done the right way for OpenWrt (at least in my opinion).
> >> OpenWrt recently joined the Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC):
> >> https://sfconservancy.org/projects/current/ .
> >> 
> >> The SFC is designed to help member projects to deal with problems like
> >> this: https://sfconservancy.org/projects/services/ .
> >> 
> >> So, as a first step, those with standing to act on OpenWrt's behalf
> >> (committers/Decisionmakers? or whoever has been designated as OpenWrt's
> >> liaison with the SFC?) should probably communicate the concerns to the
> >> SFC.  The SFC should then propose possible next steps & state the
> >> benefits or disadvantages of each.
> >> 
> >> As for legal action: IANAL but I think in at least some jurisdictions,
> >> trade marks lose validity if not enforced.  If so, the SFC may advise
> >> legal action against NXP & other vendors abusing OpenWrt trade marks
> >> (because otherwise OpenWrt would lose those trade marks).
> >> 
> >> The action might not involve going to court, it might initially just be
> >> a "cease & desist" letter sent to the vendors, perhaps stating that an
> >> acceptable resolution would be for the vendor to rename any forks they
> >> might create (e.g. "NXPwrt" or whatever).  Only if the vendors persist
> >> in abusing the trade mark might stronger action be needed.
> >> 
> > 
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> 
> 
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