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Re: The MariaDB Foundation and MariaDB trademark?

 

What does this claim mean from https://mariadb.com/kb/en/mariadb-foundation?
Is it incorrect or is there a difference between the trademarks for MariaDB
and the MariaDB server?
>>>
The MariaDB Foundation also holds the trademark of the MariaDB server and
owns mariadb.org. This ensures that the official MariaDB development
tree<https://code.launchpad.net/maria> will
always be open for the MariaDB developer community.
>>>

>From https://mariadb.org/foundation how are these goals to be achieved
given the trademark and documentation ownership (via mariadb.com/kb)? Note
the claims about that one company won't control it.
>>>
The structure of the MariaDB Foundation underpins everything we do. No one
person or company drives priorities, code, or shapes community. The MariaDB
Foundation uses technical and legal means to guarantee the technology used
by the world's largest database community will continue to be free in every
sense.
>>>

This last one should be easy to fix. The "Purchase Developer Support" link
on the front page for mariadb.org ends up at
https://www.skysql.com/about/contact. Will others get a link there?



On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 12:34 AM, Rasmus Johansson <rasmus@xxxxxxxxxxx>wrote:

> Hi Jeremy,
>
> You’re absolutely right that the trademark was owned by Monty Program
> Ab. Now after SkySQL acquired Monty Program, the trademark ownership
> has transferred to SkySQL Corporation Ab. Notice that this isn’t
> updated in trademark registers yet. The acquisition was closed on
> Monday this week and it was a prerequisite for taking matters such as
> trademarks further.
>
> The MariaDB Foundation and SkySQL are currently working on the
> trademark issue to come up with a solution on what rights to the
> trademark each entity should have. Expect to hear more about this in a
> fairly near future.
>
> MariaDB has from its beginning been a very community friendly project
> and much of the success of MariaDB relies in that fact. SkySQL of
> course respects that.
>
> Best regards,
> Rasmus
>
> VP Engineering, SkySQL
> Board member, MariaDB Foundation
>
>
> On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 1:27 AM, Jeremy Cole <jeremycole@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > While poking around on the various sites (discussed at length in previous
> > threads) I was left wondering about the MariaDB trademark. I was under
> the
> > impression this was going to be owned by and managed by the MariaDB
> > Foundation. It seems like it was registered by Monty Program Ab though,
> and
> > never transferred to or owned by MariaDB Foundation. So, after the
> > acquisition it is now owned by SkySQL.
> >
> > The SkySQL site's "Trademarks" page definitively confirms this with the
> text
> > «The "MariaDB" trademark is wholly owned by SkySQL Corporation Ab and is
> a
> > registered trademark in ...».
> >
> > So, I am left wondering what happened? Was my original understanding
> > incorrect, or was this never properly followed through? While I would
> hope
> > SkySQL is a good community member and would not do anything bad with the
> > trademark, this does defeat a lot of the original idea with the
> foundation,
> > by my understanding, and leaves a single commercial entity in more or
> less
> > full control of MariaDB's future.
> >
> > Can anyone provide some insight?
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Jeremy
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> >
>
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-- 
Mark Callaghan
mdcallag@xxxxxxxxx

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