well put. I think that clearly WMF legal department assumed that having the trademark registered is such a good idea that it does not require a dialogue with the community, while the symbolic beginnings and the history of logo creation make such a move, especially without a prior discussion and explanation, clearly awkward.
I believe that a lot of unnecessary ruckus and bad faith assumptions stem from poor dialogue between WMF and the community at large... dj On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Heather Ford <[email protected]>wrote: > +1, Nathan. I think you very articulately pointed out the key problem > that's been misidentified in this i.e. that the problem is *not* in WMF's > protection of Wikimedia TM's generally (although I think there is still > much to be improved about a process that results in stories like this > https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/04/wikipedia-threatens-) but rather > where the WMF chose to register a logo that was specifically designed by a > member of the community to be used by groups who do not purport to > represent the WMF but want something they can remix for their own thematic > projects or use for unaffiliated events. > > And I think it's unfair to suggest that any time someone complains about > something the Foundation is doing they're exhibiting bad faith. If that was > true, any critique would be an act of bad faith. We're all, in our own way, > trying to help Wikimedia grow and flourish. The truth is that we have > different ideas about how to get there. > > best, > Heather. > > On Mar 19, 2013, at 9:00 PM, Nathan wrote: > > I won't argue the fact that there is value in protecting the > iconography of the Wikimedia movement from abuse. What I argue with is > the approach of the legal department - to unilaterally, and without > notice, contradict the purpose of a set of logos by declaring > ownership over them, and then to at the same time suggest the > community hold a contest to create a whole new set of logos over which > the WMF will supposedly not take the same action. > > To then frame the discussion with repeated notes about the distinction > between copyright and trademark makes it sound like they see this as a > problem of a lack of knowledge and understanding on the part of their > critics', which simply isn't the case. > > The reality is if they had suggested last year that "hey, the > Foundation wants to make sure these marks are protected from abuse, > would anyone mind if we registered them just to make sure they aren't > abused? We'll allow them to be used with a standard permission set > that doesn't require a request process." then the response would've > been absolutely minimal and positive. But they didn't. > > If you're familiar with my posts to this list, I'm not normally on the > anti-WMF side of debates (for instance, wrt WCA). But when they make a > boob move, I don't think its bad faith to point it out. And, not for > nothing, accusing others of bad faith is generally ill advised. > Anyway, this is a small bore issue, and the consequences of any > outcome are mild to say the least. But, a few posts on a wiki and on > wikimedia-l don't cost much ;) > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list > [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list > [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l > _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
