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All other considerations aside, why not reach out in a friendly way before unleashing the lawyers? Surely this holds true for anyone interested in building a co

All other considerations aside, why not reach out in a friendly way before unleashing the lawyers? Surely this holds true for anyone interested in building a community.

pacificmint 6y ago
Isn’t that what they did with the letter posted in the tweet? I suppose they could’ve done it with a little less ‘ultimatum’, but it looks like they _did_ reach out before unleashing anything else.
- andybak 6y ago
  Well the tone was well off - and as another reply points out they seem to have realised this and have tweeted a firm apology. https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009 https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009
undecisive 6y ago
Indeed. I'm not a lawyer, but clearly there are at least two routes to defending your trademark: ask people to "license" the trademark, or go to court over it. A site that clearly helps build up a brand should be a no-brainer for a free (or if the law does not allow, a £1) trademark agreement that ensures common sense things like "the site should clearly state it's unaffiliated" (which it does) or "the raspberry pi foundation should get first consideration if the site is ever sold". I do hope Eben Upton weighs in on this, because whoever signed this off, it's a bad decision all round. Blaming trademark law is just a dishonest get-out-of-jail-free that big corporations use to justify belligerent bad-faith dealing. I hope the Raspberry Pi Foundation can show that it's different. This is not a good start.
monokh 6y ago
Scale probably. Trademark protection is too costly to conduct on an individual basis. The easiest solution is to fire and forget. They have also replied indicating something to this effect. https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009 https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009 "This letter was automatically sent to"
627467 6y ago
Because it's cheaper to have legal interns/contractors do this kind of work who are paid for enforcement not for PR. And to know how to handle these situations with tact and decency cost a lot more money. Also: trademark law is an opening for DDOS/spam attack: anyone can easily infringe, anyone can easily send threatening legal letter and now with social media, anyone can easily get outrage points up by posting legal letters online.
kube-system 6y ago
> why not reach out in a friendly way before unleashing the lawyers? This is a letter from the foundation. I don't see any lawyers listed anywhere, and no indication that they have taken legal action.

All other considerations aside, why not reach out in a friendly way before unleashing the lawyers? Surely this holds true for anyone interested in building a community.

pacificmint 6y ago

Isn’t that what they did with the letter posted in the tweet? I suppose they could’ve done it with a little less ‘ultimatum’, but it looks like they _did_ reach out before unleashing anything else.

andybak 6y ago
Well the tone was well off - and as another reply points out they seem to have realised this and have tweeted a firm apology. https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009 https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009

undecisive 6y ago

Indeed. I'm not a lawyer, but clearly there are at least two routes to defending your trademark: ask people to "license" the trademark, or go to court over it. A site that clearly helps build up a brand should be a no-brainer for a free (or if the law does not allow, a £1) trademark agreement that ensures common sense things like "the site should clearly state it's unaffiliated" (which it does) or "the raspberry pi foundation should get first consideration if the site is ever sold". I do hope Eben Upton weighs in on this, because whoever signed this off, it's a bad decision all round. Blaming trademark law is just a dishonest get-out-of-jail-free that big corporations use to justify belligerent bad-faith dealing. I hope the Raspberry Pi Foundation can show that it's different. This is not a good start.

monokh 6y ago

Scale probably. Trademark protection is too costly to conduct on an individual basis. The easiest solution is to fire and forget. They have also replied indicating something to this effect. https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009 https://twitter.com/Raspberry_Pi/status/1318494942478635009 "This letter was automatically sent to"

627467 6y ago

Because it's cheaper to have legal interns/contractors do this kind of work who are paid for enforcement not for PR. And to know how to handle these situations with tact and decency cost a lot more money. Also: trademark law is an opening for DDOS/spam attack: anyone can easily infringe, anyone can easily send threatening legal letter and now with social media, anyone can easily get outrage points up by posting legal letters online.

kube-system 6y ago

> why not reach out in a friendly way before unleashing the lawyers? This is a letter from the foundation. I don't see any lawyers listed anywhere, and no indication that they have taken legal action.