

Liblime seeks trademark for an open source product created by an NZ library - Tsagadai
http://diligentroom.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/the-exemplar-of-stupid-koha-vs-liblime-trademark/

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spectre
I'm surprised the Maori Advisory Board of the Intellectual Property Office
hasn't blocked this on the grounds that 'koha' is a Te Reo Maori word
(translated as gift or offering). They tend to be highly protective of the
language as it's considered to be taonga (treasure).

~~~
metel
I'd be surprised if it turned out they had any say in the matter. Imagine if
the proud and venerable Brî'tíšh people had the power to block the usage of
such words as "Windows" to describe a software product.

~~~
aptwebapps
Usage is one thing, trademark is another. And what pertains in the British
Isles does necessarily pertain in New Zealand.

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gluejar
The title here misrepresents the article. It doesn't say the New Zealand
library is being sued. On the contrary, the article says they are raising
money to oppose a trademark application.

~~~
Tsagadai
It wasn't my intention to be misleading, I just misread. I've updated the
link.

~~~
gluejar
Thanks, it helps the cause to stick to the facts.

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wizzyrea
Actually, the US trademark was being held by the former owners of LibLime
(Metavore, Inc) in trust for the community. It was used as a bargaining chip
against the wishes of the community in the acquisition of LibLime by PTFS in
2010.

The community really got riled up about this in 2010, and all other community
trademarks and IP were transitioned to HLT ownership as stewards of the
community IP. They own the current domain (<http://koha-community.org>) and
the French trademark (the French company, Biblibre, was holding the French
trademark in safekeeping for the community, and paid to have the trademark
transferred to HLT's control). There were talks in 2010 of PTFS "allowing" the
community to "use" the koha.org domain under their supervision, but it was
clear that they wanted editorial control over the site and so it was decided
to abandon koha.org.

The NZ trademark fracas has been going on for a solid year now, Metavore
(LibLime) had filed for the trademark in NZ not more than a few weeks before
they sold themselves to PTFS. PTFS could have chosen to withdraw the
application, but chose not to. Joann Ransom, director of HLT explains it all
on Radio NZ quite clearly: <http://ur1.ca/5zz67>

The line PTFS gives is that the trademarks were purchased from LibLime who
bought them fair and square from Katipo - which is fair, they did. But they
were allowed to register trademarks with the understanding from the community
that the assets would be held in good faith, and they have not been - they
have been hijacked.

Koha is a gift that HLT gave libraries the world around, and PTFS/LibLime has
taken undue advantage of that gift, abusing the community they purport to be a
part of.

------
chappi42
from the article:

"The situation we find ourselves in, is that after over a year of battling
against it, PTFS/Liblime have managed to have their application for a
Trademark on Koha in New Zealand accepted. We now have 3 months to object, but
to do so involves lawyers and money. We are a small semi rural Library in New
Zealand and have no cash spare in our operational budget to afford this, but
we do feel it is something we must fight.

For the library that invented Koha to now have to have a legal battle to
prevent a US company trademarking the word in NZ seems bizarre, but it is at
this point that we find ourselves."

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1point2
More appropriate for Reddit - however being a Kiwi (and someone who once had a
trademark problem) I find it amazing the Maori Advisory Board had no problem
(I think 'shame on them') and wonder why they did not object.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koha_(custom)> seems to be a common enough term.

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nl
I found this, from January 2010 (note the "including the US trademark"):

 _LibLime (which is actually a trade name of Columbus, Ohio based Metavore,
Inc.) was started in 2005 by Joshua Ferraro, Tina Berger and two others.
LibLime has been the hardest-charging and fastest-growing proponent of the
Koha Library System in the world. Over the intervening years, LibLime has
acquired key Koha-related assets, including the US trademark, copyrights to
Koha source code, and the Koha website. The combination of PTFS and LibLime
will be supporting 640 installations of Koha under 123 contracts_

[http://go-to-hellman.blogspot.com/2010/01/ptfs-to-acquire-li...](http://go-
to-hellman.blogspot.com/2010/01/ptfs-to-acquire-liblime-and-move-to.html)

If that was in 2010, why is it a big issue now?

~~~
samich
Because this is about the NZ trademark.

[http://elliottbledsoe.com/2011/11/keep-koha-trademark-
open-s...](http://elliottbledsoe.com/2011/11/keep-koha-trademark-open-source/)

~~~
nl
Yes, but why does that matter?

I understand that the author is from NZ, and the software originated there,
but surely the time to object was when the original (presumably US?) trademark
was issued? Or at least some outrage could have been expressed at that point?

~~~
archangel_one
How are the Horowhenua Library Trust meant to know when the US trademark is
issued? I can't imagine they're keeping an extremely close eye on all the
trademarks being issued over there.

~~~
nl
The author of the blog post clearly follows the field.

~~~
samich
In their own country, of course they do, im not sure why you are so set on
straw manning, but hey, whatever floats your boat

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melloclello
The Maori Language Commission are going to be all over this like a ton of
bricks, 'koha' is such a generic word here (my best guess is that it sort of
means 'wilful donation' in English)

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helmut_hed
I'd like to hear more about this from the other side. Someone on the original
thread has commented to the effect that the library permitted the contractor
("Katipo"?) who wrote the software in the first place to sell the IP to the
people who are seeking the trademark... No idea if that's true, of course, and
really, why try to trademark it in the place it came from? But still, I'd like
to know more.

~~~
_kate_
There's a long, convoluted history of issues between the Koha community and
Liblime over community 'assets', some of which is summarised here:
<http://lwn.net/Articles/386284/>

LibLime acquired the Koha portions of Katipo Communications back in 2007,
including the koha.org domain name and other assets. The Koha community
subsequently had to move to koha-community.org.

~~~
ow1n
"Had to" because Liblime stopped sharing access to the site, something which
they had promised to do when taking over maintenance of it (get it in writing
next time). Koha.org now exclusively promotes Liblime's non-open fork of Koha.

~~~
obelos
PTFS/LibLime's "non-open fork" of Koha is available on Github:
<https://github.com/liblime/LibLime-Koha>. We gratefully accept pull requests
and bug reports there, as well. We're pushing yet another release there next
week.

Shortly after the acquisition of LibLime, PTFS offered up the koha.org domain
for sale to several community members, including HLT and other vendors, as a
means of hopefully rectifying the relationship with them. No one bit, so we've
retained it.

~~~
samich
Citation needed, can you point to evidence of this? Also ... this has nothing
do with Liblime trying to trademark Koha in NZ.

~~~
obelos
Ask them.

If you think domain ownership and trademark have no bearing upon each other, I
can't help you.

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tingletech
some more info on the backstory is on wikipedia
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LibLime>

~~~
tingletech
see also more discussion on code4lib listserv
[http://serials.infomotions.com/code4lib/archive/2011/201111/...](http://serials.infomotions.com/code4lib/archive/2011/201111/2720.html)
and
[http://serials.infomotions.com/code4lib/archive/2011/201111/...](http://serials.infomotions.com/code4lib/archive/2011/201111/thread.html)

