The CPAN is an international set of services, with the master servers in
Finland I believe. Does the Buzan Organisation hold the Finnish trade mark?
There's modules that go up with company's named all the time.
I can't recall any cases of take down notices, although there may have
been some. But in practice, you aren't making any money off "Mind Map"
and it's clear to anybody that looks at the documentation you aren't
related. So there's no money, you aren't hurting them, and where or what
would they sue anyway.
Also, trademarks are never on terms, they are on terms in specific
contexts (I am not a lawyer, but I have two trade marks). The mark
exists for something more specific usually than just the words, and in a
specific catagory of product. Which is why for example, there's a
company in Australia called Microsoft that makes pillows.
So "don't ask, don't tell" and if they ever hit you up about it, despite
the waste of money to them, take it down immediately, and as a protest I
for one will grab the most recent version, and re-release it myself.
Assuming that this is an American trade mark you are talking about, I'm
not sure why they might sue an Australian with a website in American
Samoa, releasing software in Finland.
Or I'm sure there are other authors in an arbitrarily large number of
different legal systems that would do the same.
But in all practicality, unless you are making money or harming them,
you aren't a target. Just don't bring their attention to it.
Adam K
James Muir wrote:
Hi All,
I submitted a module recently to CPAN (April 2, 2006) with the namespace
Gtk2::Ex::MindMapView.
I've recently learned that the words "mind map" are are trademarked by
the Buzan Organisation, Ltd. So now I'm thinking that I ought to rename
my module before a legal eagle in the Buzan Organisation notifies me
that I've violated their trade mark.
So, what is the best way to go about this? Can I remove a module from
CPAN and later replace it with another renamed module?
-James
