4 ms·

Mozilla should start charging a licensing fee for starting your user agent with Mozilla/ Money problems solved!

by impure 1y ago

wvbdmp 1y ago
In a way it seems like a classic trademark violation, tricking people (or their servers) into thinking your product is someone else’s. I wonder if there are actual agreements about this these days.
- rileymat2 1y ago
  The mark in this usage has gone unprotected for so long, I doubt there would be any success with that. Also, I doubt tricking servers would indicate creating consumer confusion with the trademark.
  - ojosilva 1y ago
    Yeah, but the case law resulting from the denied ruling could prove valuable for others who need to defend their use of trademarks in API naming. "API" here refers to the broad judicial term, where the User-Agent header falls under.
- im3w1l 1y ago
  Adversarial compatibility is pretty nice though, I don't think we should do away with it.
- userbinator 1y ago
  See Sega v. Accolade for a precedent of why that likely won't work.
- wmf 1y ago
  User agent strings aren't really seen by people so arguably there is no consumer confusion. And if you need the Mozilla user agent for compatibility it's reminiscent of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - Retric 1y ago
    https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1114 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1114 Statute doesn’t reference consumers, and does list deception as being prohibited. So it’s at least debatable.
GuB-42 1y ago
Google would have to pay a lot of licensing fees then... > Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; Android 10; K) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/137.0.0.0 Mobile Safari/537.36 It is Mozilla (nope), Linux (yes, in a sense), Android (yes) AppleWebKit (not Apple and not WebKit), KHTML (nope), Gecko (nope), Chrome (yes), Mobile (yes), Safari (nope). So maybe they owe something to Mozilla, Apple and KDE.
- rtyu1120 1y ago
  To be fair Blink engine started as a fork of Apple's WebKit engine. Although I wouldn't be suprised if none of the WebKit code is present on Chromium now...
  - const_cast 1y ago
    And to be fair on the topic of being fair, Apple's WebKit started as a fork of KHTML. So the string makes some sense.
brunoarueira 1y ago
One of the comments from the accepted answer says that the Mozilla was the codename for Netscape, link: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1114254/why-do-all-browsers-user-agents-start-with-mozilla#comment32611935_1114297 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1114254/why-do-all-brows...
- Rediscover 1y ago
  There's a better explanation in the last comment on the page You linked. ISTR that Netscape used to have in it's README or INSTALL (or maybe an "about"-like menu entry) a note that the name of the browser is pronounced Mozilla while only being spelled N-E-T-S-C-A-P-E.
1vuio0pswjnm7 1y ago
Maybe then folks would stop sending this header. To avoid licensing fees. I have been omitting it for decades with great results.

Mozilla should start charging a licensing fee for starting your user agent with Mozilla/ Money problems solved!

by impure 1y ago

Mozilla should start charging a licensing fee for starting your user agent with Mozilla/ Money problems solved!

In a way it seems like a classic trademark violation, tricking people (or their servers) into thinking your product is someone else’s. I wonder if there are actual agreements about this these days.

rileymat2 1y ago
The mark in this usage has gone unprotected for so long, I doubt there would be any success with that. Also, I doubt tricking servers would indicate creating consumer confusion with the trademark.
- ojosilva 1y ago
  Yeah, but the case law resulting from the denied ruling could prove valuable for others who need to defend their use of trademarks in API naming. "API" here refers to the broad judicial term, where the User-Agent header falls under.
im3w1l 1y ago
Adversarial compatibility is pretty nice though, I don't think we should do away with it.
userbinator 1y ago
See Sega v. Accolade for a precedent of why that likely won't work.
wmf 1y ago
User agent strings aren't really seen by people so arguably there is no consumer confusion. And if you need the Mozilla user agent for compatibility it's reminiscent of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- Retric 1y ago
  https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1114 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1114 Statute doesn’t reference consumers, and does list deception as being prohibited. So it’s at least debatable.

GuB-42 1y ago

Google would have to pay a lot of licensing fees then... > Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; Android 10; K) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/137.0.0.0 Mobile Safari/537.36 It is Mozilla (nope), Linux (yes, in a sense), Android (yes) AppleWebKit (not Apple and not WebKit), KHTML (nope), Gecko (nope), Chrome (yes), Mobile (yes), Safari (nope). So maybe they owe something to Mozilla, Apple and KDE.

rtyu1120 1y ago
To be fair Blink engine started as a fork of Apple's WebKit engine. Although I wouldn't be suprised if none of the WebKit code is present on Chromium now...
- const_cast 1y ago
  And to be fair on the topic of being fair, Apple's WebKit started as a fork of KHTML. So the string makes some sense.

brunoarueira 1y ago

One of the comments from the accepted answer says that the Mozilla was the codename for Netscape, link: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1114254/why-do-all-browsers-user-agents-start-with-mozilla#comment32611935_1114297 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1114254/why-do-all-brows...

Rediscover 1y ago
There's a better explanation in the last comment on the page You linked. ISTR that Netscape used to have in it's README or INSTALL (or maybe an "about"-like menu entry) a note that the name of the browser is pronounced Mozilla while only being spelled N-E-T-S-C-A-P-E.

1vuio0pswjnm7 1y ago

Maybe then folks would stop sending this header. To avoid licensing fees. I have been omitting it for decades with great results.