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Clarification on the Notepad++ Trademark Issue
- jonaustin 6mo agoDon Ho handled this like an absolute champ. I think the cloner had good intent, but he didn't get approval, so absolutely not okay no matter what.
- a10c 6mo agoIf “good intent” means making a copycat website and putting Don Ho’s name on the author bio page.
- brian_herman 6mo agoGood on you enforcing your trademark!
- droidjj 6mo agoThat kind of hate is why we struggle to keep good open source maintainers. Let’s try to be kind to people who gift their time and talent to the world, please.
- dormento 6mo agoI'm assuming in good faith you're talking about the hatemail Don receiveid. I agree. As an open source software enjoyer, I know that unless specified otherwise (and arguably even then), there are exactly _zero_ contractual and/or legal obligations on the part of the maintainer. I'm happy to benefit from battle-tested code, and I'm even happier when I can contribute back to it, for the benefit of all. This is the spirit of open source. Being purposefully obtuse to open source maintainers of such important piece of software is bad for everyone involved. Also, he's taken a political stance in the past, which turns him into a magnet for certain discussions.
- droidjj 6mo agoOh, I hadn't even considered my comment could be taken the other way. I'm absolutely referring to the nasty email this guy received.
- s0ss 6mo agoIf you don’t actively protect your trademark, you risk losing your trademark. Im surprised that isn’t part of his reasoning.
- joe_mamba 6mo agoIt's not about losing your trademark but about someone you don't know and can't yet trust, potentially using your trademark for their own goals. It'd be like letting someone use your name and social security number to identify themselves. You wouldn't want that even if it's a friend, let alone a stranger you never met in person. Let's say the IRGC, Mossad or NSA is behind that developer of the Notepad++ on Mac clone and would love to piggyback on your trademark name in order to push a spyware infected app on to some targets. You don't know them and can't trust them so you don't want them using your name because that would backfire on you. There's plenty of precedent with this in browser extensions, where once they become super popular they end up being sold and bought by some shady Israeli PE or ad-tech company with ties to Mossad. You don't want your name or trademark anywhere near this, if you value it, so you'll have to call out and ban everyone who tries to use it without your explicit permission. This isn't the developer trying to be a dick to other developers, this is the developer exercising common sense and self preservation.
- ButlerianJihad 6mo agoA PR from the MANPADS codebase is always a dead giveaway
- ASalazarMX 6mo agoDon Ho mixes politics with his work, thus Notepad++ has been targeted in the past by state-sponsored hackers to deliver malware. A vibe/agent coded fork (it was made just last March) is a huge security risk, the brand weakening is just the cherry on the cake. Of course I'd prefer for Don Ho to voice his political opinions through more appropriate channels, but it is what it is.
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- EvanAnderson 6mo agoI know it's more nuanced than this, but generally (in the US, at least) holders of a trademark need to defend the mark at the peril of "abandonment" or the mark becoming "generic". I expected to see something about this in the post.
- w4rh4wk5 6mo agoI commonly hear people saying that, but then other people claiming this isn't true. Is there a clear source for this mechanism?
- munk-a 6mo agoYou can find examples in each direction but, considering the potential damage of not defending a trademark, it's usually worth being quite proactive about that defense. There isn't a clear source (at least that I'm aware of) since this is handled by the legal system with a lot of nuance on a case by case basis. It is very reasonable to be proactive in trademark defense but if you aren't courts may still side with you if the establishment of usage was clear.
- jmuguy 6mo agoA pretty recent example would be Twitter https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnbbrandon/2026/01/06/operation-bluebird-has-ambitious-plans-to-restore-the-twitter-brand/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnbbrandon/2026/01/06/operati...
- intrikate 6mo agoIt was a big enough deal that Nintendo put out advertisements in 1990 [0], asking people to not use "a Nintendo" to refer generically to other video game systems, specifically out of fear of genericization. [0] https://old.reddit.com/r/nintendo/comments/5m9grz/theres_no_such_thing_as_a_nintendo_1990_poster/ https://old.reddit.com/r/nintendo/comments/5m9grz/theres_no_...
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- klustregrif 6mo agoOpenSource is about freedom have the code, not freedom to have a projects identity. Its disgusting to see people attacking an author of a successful project who's openly allowing forks just because someone decided to go beyond forking the code and tried to also steal the brand. It's a case of someone putting out candy for halloween and someons running away with the bowl screeming! Well you put i out there! I hope to see an appology from the author of the fork who's hopefully understanding that what they did is not ok.
- ronsor 6mo agoI don't know why people are up in arms about this. No one is mad about the port of Notepad++ to macOS. No one is mad that someone said "I ported Notepad++ to macOS." The problem is the branding and delivery conveys the impression that the macOS port is official, which is deceptive even if deception isn't the goal.
- malfist 6mo agoI'm not following your comment. You say you don't know why people are up in arms about it, but then you go on to note that the author of the port is being deceptive.
- intrikate 6mo agoI believe they meant "why people are so up in arms about the developer being so strict about enforcing their trademark," not "why are people upset that the port author is being deceptive."
- malfist 6mo agoAhh, that reframe makes a lot more sense
- alterom 6mo agoThe people were up in arms against the Notepad++ author doing something about the deception. Which was why they felt they had to write this post. Read the article.
- emmelaich 6mo agoThe difference is intent. It will deceive people whether or not the author's intent is deception.
- nkrisc 6mo agoPeople are upset about the deceptive misuse of the trademark. Rightfully so, it’s deceptive and misleading, legal issues aside.
- slopinthebag 6mo agoCould they call it Notepad+²? After all, Notepad++ is about as different from Notepad as Notepad+² is from Nodepad++.
- johncessna 6mo agoI'd call it Notepad#
- munk-a 6mo agoI have over four years of experience programming in Notepad pound.
- ASalazarMX 6mo agoObjectiveNotepad Plus Pro Max
- olyjohn 6mo agoOr subscribe to ObjectiveNotepad Plus Pro Max+ for $2.99/mo.
- doctorpangloss 6mo agoimagine complaining about trademark issues when notepad++ is two plusses added to the name of a microsoft product
- Etoro1942 6mo agoYou have to actively protect your trademark
- etchalon 6mo agoIt's weird everyone is treating this anything other than what Don is saying - port's fine, don't make it sound like we endorsed this. Don't make us responsible for your product.
- ryandrake 6mo agoI don't have a dog in this race, but I'm having a hard time seeing both sides. The code is GPL, it can be forked. Does the GPL specify that the user has to change the name when it's forked? Or is that some extra clause that this particular developer added to the license? Does the GPL say anything at all about trademarks? The name of the forked project seems to be kind of a weird hill to want to die on. Linux is GPL'ed and the name Linux is also trademarked. But if I decided to port it to run on a lava lamp, what would be wrong with my calling the project "Linux for Lava Lamp"? A fork's existence does not obligate the mainline maintainer to maintain the fork, no matter what the name of the fork is. As long as the forked project makes the relationship (or lack of relationship) and support expectations clear, I'm not sure what this battle was about.
- margalabargala 6mo ago> Does the GPL specify that the user has to change the name when it's forked? No, in the same way the GPL does not specify the user must use their own computer to develop the fork rather than taking the upstream maintainer's laptop home without asking. The GPL grants no rights whatsoever to use the name, just the code.
- ryandrake 6mo agoBut the GPL grants rights to use the code, which itself contains the name. Is there language in the license that exempts "the source code that contains the project name" from my ability to copy and redistribute it?
- margalabargala 6mo agoYou're asking the wrong questions because you're mixing up copyright and trademark law. The GPL covers copyright. It includes the source code, which as you noted contains the project name. This is why you may click "fork" on GitHub and wind up with a fork that is "yours" under the original name. Trademark law is usage based. If you then set up a website for your fork under the original name, that's illegal. The fact that you're allowed to have a fork containing that name isn't relevant. Copyright allows the code, but you're now violating trademark law.
- jmuguy 6mo agoLinked post that shows what the mac port website originally looked like makes this pretty clear https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/npp-trademark-infringement/ https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/npp-trademark-infringemen... GPL and other licenses allow you all sorts of leeway with the code but not the name and branding of the product the code is running.
- deepfriedbits 6mo agoYikes. They even placed his name and bio on the Notepad++ for Mac website to help legitimize it.
- varun_ch 6mo agoNotepad++ for Mac was renamed to Nextpad++ (“a small nod to Mac history”) Personally I think NextPad would’ve been a perfectly acceptable (and subjectively better) name
- thesuitonym 6mo agoNextPad++ signals that this is related to Notepad++, while also saying that it's not Notepad++. NextPad would be a better name for a standalone editor.
- liamgm 6mo agoNeXT + Notepad++ or NeXT + iPad + ObjC++ , nice , also Nextpad editor already exist , i found two.
- Analemma_ 6mo agoThere's a problem where generic skepticism of intellectual property law— which isn't bad in and of itself— all too frequently morphs into uninformed all-consuming opposition to any kind of IP enforcement whatsoever, without understanding the purpose it serves or why it might be necessary. "The code is open to forking, but we need to enforce our trademarks because otherwise anyone can upload malware claiming to be Notepad++" is a real, legitimate concern and not some kind of ghastly imposition, but I think whoever sent that email didn't even bother thinking about that. They just saw somebody defending IP rights and went straight into attack mode, because that's what a lot of online communities have trained people to do reflexively.
- zamadatix 6mo agoTo hopefully save some here the risk of an embarrassing redaction mistake: Redaction should be done by deleting the content from the media AND THEN adding decoration you want to indicate the material was removed. If you do things any other way you're liable to end up with something like the attempt on the site where the email might as well have been highlighted instead.
- llbbdd 6mo agoCan also be useful information to have if you want to give the appearance of having diligently redacted without doing too much to protect some asshole. IMO if the author of that email wanted to protect their anonymity and employability they should have used a throwaway, Don is doing them an undeserved service by even half-assedly blocking it out.
- zamadatix 6mo agoI don't think that's the kind of person Don is. If he wanted to out them he wouldn't have tried to act like it was an accident.
- llbbdd 6mo agoI don't think so either, I'm saying he's a better person than I am for blocking it out as much as he did. If someone sends me a filthy email like that I don't particularly care if their name and contact info are made public or what happens afterwards.
- zamadatix 6mo agoI'm not here to pass judgement one way or the other on what one would/should do in regards to redactions but there are reasons beyond politeness to not share such private communications & information publicly without consent (especially in Europe where Don is).
- VimEscapeArtist 6mo agoOK but just use Zed anyway
- criddell 6mo agoOn Windows Notepad++ uses native controls and (IMHO) that alone makes it much more pleasant to use than Zed.
- fn-mote 6mo agoIs leaving many many typos in your posts a way of proving it was written by a human? I guess so. I support the author’s stance, but the extra decoding required to read the post was not expected.
- a10c 6mo agoA bit dramatic. It’s a 15 second read