Huh, interesting. Bluesky the company trademarked the name of "AT Protocol" as "primarily a defensive measure" against abuse.
Going forward, "most everyday use cases [won't] require a license".
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@stefan@stefanbohacek.online
I think its a good idea in case another company tries to trademark it, and we end up with a situation similar to javascript
@irelephant It's not quite the same though, no?
Eg. Python Software Foundation trademarking "Python" makes sense.
This is more like someone trademarking SMTP.
If Mastodon trademarked ActivityPub, this would also look highly unusual.
@stefan@stefanbohacek.online
doesn't the w3c hold the trademarks for AP?
@irelephant I wouldn't expect that, and don't really see any evidence that "ActivityPub" has been trademarked by anyone.
@stefan@stefanbohacek.online
>
The absence of a product or service name or logo from this list does not constitute a waiver of W3C's trademark, ability to use a generic term, or other intellectual rights concerning that name or logo.
https://www.w3.org/trademarks/
Which is linked to on https://www.w3.org/policies/#W3C_Trademarks , which in turn is liked on https://www.w3.org/TR/activitypub/ :
>
Copyright © 2018 W3C® (MIT, ERCIM, Keio, Beihang). W3C liability, trademark and permissive document license rules apply
Could be wrong though. They claim a trademark on other specs they control, like xml/css
#W3C_Trademarks
Trying to see if there is a precedence for this and learning about the "EMAIL invention controversy".
"In 1982, [American engineer, entrepreneur, and anti-vaccine activist V. A. Shiva Ayyadurai] registered the copyright for the source code and user documentation of the FORTRAN program called EMAIL."
Yikes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiva_Ayyadurai#EMAIL_invention_controversy
![morph [TEMP]](https://morph.todon.de/system/accounts/avatars/116/512/390/928/175/180/original/f1cf7ebd32c8d785.png "morph [TEMP]")
@stefan yeah, that gives me pause. Before this came up I was discussing the possibility with @mfeilner about the term "Fediverse" being trademarked by someone somewhere for possible rent-seeking. I know we have a lot of prior art and consider it as part of the commons but I don't know if that actually means real-world protection for the term.
