
Help the Gnome Foundation Defend the Gnome Trademark Against Groupon - PaulSec
https://www.gnome.org/groupon/
======
cs702
Wow, all evidence suggests that the team in charge of this at Groupon is
acting in bad faith, trying to bulldoze over a non-profit with fewer financial
resources. (I doubt Groupon would ever attempt something like this against a
financially-well-backed brand such as, say, "Apple.")

Consider: (1) it's essentially impossible that no one involved had ever heard
of the Gnome desktop (it's the top result when I search for "gnome" on
Google); and (2) after being contacted by the Gnome Foundation, Groupon filed
even more trademark applications.

There are a lot of decent, hard-working hackers at Groupon, and quite a few of
them, I'm sure, regularly visit HN. They won't be happy to find out about
this.

Are there any Groupon insiders here willing to comment on this, maybe
anonymously?

\--

UPDATE: Groupon just released an official response:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8590343](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8590343)
\-- they now say they will be "glad to look for another name." If they really
mean it, kudos to them for changing their position!

~~~
erikb
I agree with 2 but not with 1. I think there are loads of people out there who
have heard that there is something like Linux, but have never used it. If you
never used any *nix you probably don't even know that desktop environments can
be switched or changed. Then how would you know about a specific desktop
environment? Not accepting to respect a 17 year old trademark is very, very
bad though.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
You think the team creating a POS terminal at Groupon hadn't heard of GNOME?

The very first thing you do when considering customer facing names for
products is a web search: first page of hits for me is filled with GNOME
desktop.

~~~
erikb
> The very first thing you _should_ do [...]

Yes, but often people don't do what they are supposed to do. I did the same
mistake with an open source project I've written for my thesis. Things like
that happen all the time. Especially for people in Windows world there is not
much else outside. They probably haven't heard about TextMate or XCode either.

------
jevgeni
Groupon takes the pole position for the amount of douchebagery they dished out
within such a short period of their existence.

~~~
medecau
What about ÜBER?

~~~
marknutter
What has Uber done?

~~~
Fard
This for example.

[http://www.theverge.com/2014/8/26/6067663/this-is-ubers-
play...](http://www.theverge.com/2014/8/26/6067663/this-is-ubers-playbook-for-
sabotaging-lyft)

~~~
viscanti
Except that was actually good.

[http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/virtues-ubers-
ope...](http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/virtues-ubers-operation-
slog)

------
skratlo
I don't get it either. If GNOME (the desktop environment and the foundation)
have a trademark on GNOME, why do they need $80k to defend it? Shouldn't the
trademark office then simply reject any further application for GNOME name
related to computers, software and operating systems? Is this because of the
idiotic defunc. justice system the US is imposing on themselves? Where you can
sue mall owner for millions because you slipped on his floor? sigh

~~~
Cthulhu_
IIRC, the rule is that if you don't step up yourself to defend your trademark
whenever someone else tries to use it, your trademark becomes void.

~~~
skratlo
Could you kindly explain me then what's the point of registering a trademark?
Is it something you can then wave with in front of jury? Do you really need
$80k for that? Do you need $80k to print out your accepted trademark
application, and prove that you're in the business for 17 years? Sorry this is
just complete non-sense and failure of the system.

~~~
bad_user
Not only that, but those $80k could have paid for quite a few months of
development, but instead those will be money going down the drain because of a
broken justice system. And they have the nerve to say that IP laws are fueling
innovation.

~~~
ekianjo
Trademark has barely anything to do with IP laws. You are referring to
patents, and trademark legislation has nothing to do with patents.

~~~
maxlybbert
I didn't see any comments that applied to patents (e.g., that they cover
inventions, that they require the inventor to disclose all relevant details of
the invention, that they have definite lifetimes, etc.), so while I agree with
you and Stallman that it's important to be explicit about when you're talking
about copyright, trade secrets, patents and trademarks, I don't think
anybody's created any confusion yet.

Besides, for amusement's sake, the USPTO stands for "United States Patent and
Trademark Office."

~~~
ekianjo
> I didn't see any comments that applied to patents

Well, when someone mentioned "fuel innovation", I assume they did not talk
about trademarks, because trademarks have NOTHING to do with protecting
innovation. That's what patents are for (in theory, while I don't agree with
that, but that's a different topic).

~~~
maxlybbert
You're right: I had overlooked that statement.

------
JoshTriplett
I'm one of the folks working on the GNOME defense campaign. Happy to answer
any questions people might have.

~~~
anoncow
Hi Josh. Can you give us Groupon's perspective on this issue?

~~~
JoshTriplett
I'm working with the GNOME foundation, not with Groupon. Our perspective on
Groupon:

> It was almost inconceivable to us that Groupon, with over $2.5 billion in
> annual revenue, a full legal team and a huge engineering staff would not
> have heard of the GNOME project, found our trademark registration using a
> casual search, or even found our website, but we nevertheless got in touch
> with them and asked them to pick another name. Not only did Groupon refuse,
> but it has now filed even more trademark applications

------
jessaustin
I had thought Groupon's core competence is scamming small businesses, not
providing POS terminals for them? Do those two things go together?

~~~
Shivetya
when your business model is easily replicated and done better I guess its only
natural to extend it or simply move onto something else and integrate it to
your current product.

Does seem like one big privacy risk, really I do not think I want my POS
terminals connected to the net for any reason.

~~~
moron4hire
You mean, not even to process credit card purchases? What about uploading your
receipts and timecard records to your accountant?

It's really only the nearly antiquated systems that are not on the internet
these days.

------
Andrenid
Couldn't someone like Google, Apple, or any of the other huge companies who
have made billions with the help of *nix and OSS in general step in and help
out with what, to them, is a trivial drop in the bucket of money?

Also how is it even legal for someone to so openly and malicious intrude on a
trademarked name? I thought that's the entire point of trademarks.. it
protects you from this?

~~~
zaphoyd
Apple isn't really a stranger to announcing products with already trademarked
names..

~~~
chimeracoder
For those who don't get the reference:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer)

It would be delightfully ironic to see Apple providing money in support here,
but I'm not holding my breath.

~~~
swang
I believe parent is talking about iPhone and iPad. "iPhone" was owned by Cisco
in the US which Apple eventually bought the trademark from. I believe Apple
lost its case in China with either the iPad or iPhone name.

Apple was able to call itself Apple because they were not in the music
business (albeit there were a few quibbles about sounds) until they started
selling digital songs.

------
alasdair_
Official Groupon response: [https://engineering.groupon.com/2014/misc/gnome-
foundation-a...](https://engineering.groupon.com/2014/misc/gnome-foundation-
and-groupon-product-names/)

"There is some recent confusion around Groupon’s intended use of a product
name that the Gnome Foundation believes infringes on their trademarks.

We love open source at Groupon. We have open sourced a number of projects on
github. Our relationship with the open source community is more important to
us than a product name. We’ve been communicating with the Gnome Foundation for
months to try to come to a mutually satisfactory resolution, including
alternative branding options, and we’re happy to continue those conversations.
And if we can’t come up with a resolution, we’ll be glad to look for another
name.

We will continue to have an open line of communication with the Gnome
Foundation until this matter is resolved."

~~~
robjh
Looking for another name IS the appropriate resolution.

~~~
alasdair_
Offering GNOME a bunch of money to use the name in a specific context could be
another. That could be a win for the project overall.

------
robmccoll
I feel bad that reason I'm donating for the first time to a project that has
benefited me and so many others over the years is to help then fight a legal
battle not to help support development.

------
VMG
I really don't know what happened over there at Groupon:
[http://gnome.groupon.com/#intro/index](http://gnome.groupon.com/#intro/index)

Did they truly not know? Did they just think the Gnome project wouldn't care?
That they'll win the lawsuit?

~~~
clarkevans
Trademarks aren’t universal; they are divided into classifications e.g. market
segments. Just because the name is the same, doesn't mean the PTO will think
of them as being in the same space.

~~~
kaoD
I always thought that was more theoretical than real. For instance, could I
launch an OS called CocaCola? I don't think so...

~~~
riffraff
It seems very much real.

Someone once wrote me menacing to sue me because of my nickname which was
infringing on some of their "IP" (I kid you not).

I did a quick check and it turns out there is a half dozen brands named
something like "riffraff".

For the gnome case, just to stay in topic:
[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=toc&state=4809%3Ao...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=toc&state=4809%3Aoi1out.1.1&p_search=searchss&p_L=50&BackReference=&p_plural=yes&p_s_PARA1=&p_tagrepl~%3A=PARA1%24LD&expr=PARA1+AND+PARA2&p_s_PARA2=gnome&p_tagrepl~%3A=PARA2%24COMB&p_op_ALL=AND&a_default=search&a_search=Submit+Query&a_search=Submit+Query)

"GNOME: hosting software for use by others for accessing weather information,
for use in monitoring and controlling irrigation systems"

------
rasengan
One of the lead security people at Groupon has a big GNOME sticker on his
laptop in a pic on LinkedIn. This tells me that groupon is about to get pooped
on.

~~~
jacquesm
You should definitely save that pic and a timestamp or something to that
effect. Bonus points if you do it in front of a lawyer in the right
jurisdiction.

~~~
tluyben2
It's a bit more extreme than that; read his summary;
[https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/93i0gkawa4q15lh/2014-11-...](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/93i0gkawa4q15lh/2014-11-11%20at%2015.20.png?dl=0)

Edit: cannot be the one you meant? He is part of the GNOME foundation...

~~~
p8952
For those without access to the full LinkedIn page:
[https://i.imgur.com/ocyqh2N.png](https://i.imgur.com/ocyqh2N.png)

GNOME Foundation - January 2002 - Present (12 Years 11 Months)

~~~
mciancia
4 times member of board of directors...

WTF?!

------
mahouse
What's the point on trademarking something when later you need to pay $80,000
to defend it? The US... smh

~~~
danielweber
Someone has to pay to do the work of determining if GNOME has a valid
complaint. Even if the government were to foot the bill, they would still ask
GNOME to put their best case forward, which would involve GNOME hiring
lawyers.

~~~
mahouse
The government should do it. If they give you the means of registering a
trademark, they should at least be able of determining if a claim is valid.

~~~
WoodenChair
Right because I really want some randomly assigned government bureaucrat
making an argument one way or another on my behalf before whoever decides the
matter...

~~~
mahouse
What I mean is that the government itself should evaluate the matter and then
decide it, all by itself.

~~~
WoodenChair
Which is in a sense the same thing - do you trust the government to argue each
side of the case and make a decision internally for you? I prefer the court
system and an arguer (lawyer) of my choice.

~~~
mahouse
I don't understand. Why do you think a government agency and a court would
take a different decision at a trademark matter?

------
vayarajesh
How is it possible for Groupon to not know about GNOME? they probably have so
many development machines running GNONE in their offices..

I find it hard to believe that none of their tech team has never heard of
gnome..

Infact they should be grateful for GNONE for it being a huge part of linux
operating systems and they must have surely used it during the course of
groupon's existance

~~~
zenocon
Or maybe they even work for both companies?
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8589879](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8589879)

~~~
vayarajesh
wow.. i am just thinking that how did a company like Groupon thought they can
get away with "did not hear" about gnome.. either they are extremely dumb to
not think this through or they have already planned on how to defend and
lawyer up with the big bucks

------
steventhedev
IANAL, but legal protection for trademarks extends to any usage wherein it
would create sufficient consumer confusion.

Great example: Apple v. Apple. The computer company agreed to not enter the
music industry. To the extent of which they got sued when they added a sound
card and multimedia features to their computers. They settled for a boatload
of money rather than let a judge decide that they couldn't add any sound/media
features.

The bigger issue is that the GNOME foundation lawyers are attempting to deal
with these competing registrations individually, rather than as a class, and
trying to convince a judge that Groupon is acting in bad faith and attempting
to use the legal system to force them to abandon the trademark in the face of
excessive legal fees.

~~~
feld
> IANAL, but legal protection for trademarks extends to any usage wherein it
> would create sufficient consumer confusion.

Let's be honest though: walk up to any Joe on the street and ask them what
GNOME is. They're not going to recognize it as a *nix desktop environment or a
retail POS system.

~~~
the_ancient
The standard is not "ask any joe on the street" but "Will the create confusing
among the target consumer"

I say yes, People making purchasing choices over a companies IT infrastructure
will know what the Gnome Foundation is, that they create software of high
quality, and I can see the case for Confusion. ie

IT Manager: WOW Gnome is now making a great looking POS System.

So the fact that "Avg joe" does not know what or Who Gnome is does not matter
in the least bit

------
gnurag
Shame on you Groupon. Allow me to suggest an alternate name for your PoS
tablet: iPad

------
rectang
Donated.

I hope that Groupon finds its ability to attract and retain engineering talent
substantially degraded.

------
lucb1e
In laymans terms, can someone explain why does it costs 80 grand to protect
something you registered to be legally yours 8 years ago? If they registered
the GNOME trademark in 2006, isn't that supposed to _protect_ them from this
kind of shit instead of cost them more money when some big guy comes along and
tries to take it?

~~~
dec0dedab0de
Lawyers write laws.

Lawyers want to make money.

Lawyers write laws in a way that makes them more money.

~~~
_kst_
How would you write trademark laws to make cases like this easier?

------
xrjn
I've created a snapshot of some of the related pages, in case they ever get
taken down:

Original GNOME page:
[https://archive.today/glAva](https://archive.today/glAva)

Groupon Gnome press release:
[https://archive.today/MQk7o](https://archive.today/MQk7o)

USPTO page 1: [https://archive.today/xWlTk](https://archive.today/xWlTk)

USPTO page 2: [https://archive.today/FpeeU](https://archive.today/FpeeU)

USPTO page 3: [https://archive.today/CpI0s](https://archive.today/CpI0s)

Groupon Gnome page: [https://archive.today/yGhPF](https://archive.today/yGhPF)

------
lbredeso
Did I miss the announcement that Darl McBride was taking over as Groupon CEO?

------
swang
Does Paypal still randomly freeze accounts when they get an influx of money?

~~~
towelguy
What strikes me even more odd is that they reached their daily Bitcoin limit.

------
towelguy
If only there was some sort of blockchain technology that allowed us to
declare ownership over things and used algorithms and cryptography instead of
policies and lawyers...

------
StevePerkins
How is this trademark infringement? Generally speaking, you're allowed to use
a trademarked word in a different field (and even trademark in that field
yourself!).

The classic example is Dominos pizza vs. Domino sugar:

[http://www.wolverine-startuplaw.com/2014/03/06/analyzing-
the...](http://www.wolverine-startuplaw.com/2014/03/06/analyzing-the-looming-
trademark-disputes-over-facebooks-paper-part-3-of-3/)

Here, "Gnome" is being used in two "technical" contexts... but that's a pretty
broad brush to paint with for claiming overlap.

~~~
misterbishop
Considering both projects comprise a software user interface, I'd say it's
close enough to be concerned.

------
ommunist
Donated few bucks. I encourage everyone to do more than me. Lads, this tiny
bit of freedom is in your hands. Please do the proper thing.

------
buster
I love Gnome and use it daily but obviously it's not a desktop environment and
doesn't copy Gnome. I don't think real words like gnome (or windows) should be
trademarks and surely not when two companies do two completely different
things.

For sure, the gnome foundation doesn't want to sue garden gnome manufacturers
as well.

------
higherpurpose
Groupon still exists? Wasn't it on a death spiral a few years ago?

------
1945795
IMHO gnome should spent the money on the people who create and maintain the
software, I don't see how funneling resources into the legal system is in any
way beneficial to open and free software.

------
kristoiv
Donated.

------
voidz
Ehm.. so.. GNOME wants our help now. But how did they behave when GNOME 3 was
announced to not work without systemd? Or hey, anyone remember that discussion
on a GNOME developers' mailing list, where they planned to take out theming
support, because "it is going against the ubiquitous experience we envision
GNOME 3 to be"?

This smells fishy to me. (I said it more harshly, but realised that I went too
far, sorry about that.)

Feel free to shoot holes in my theory.

~~~
the_why_of_y
Where exactly was it "announced" that GNOME 3 does "not work without systemd"?

GNOME 3 works on FreeBSD[1][2], you just don't get the robust and secure
virtual terminal switching that only systemd's logind running on Linux can
provide.

GTK+ 3 is now fully themeable with standard W3C CSS[3]. You may need to use
Tweak Tool to change your theme, but is that really too much to ask for?

But please, don't let these facts stop you from cheering on large corporations
as they trample all over open source projects.

[1] [http://blogs.gnome.org/mclasen/2014/02/19/on-
portability/](http://blogs.gnome.org/mclasen/2014/02/19/on-portability/) [2]
[http://blogs.gnome.org/desrt/2014/03/26/gnome-3-12-and-
freeb...](http://blogs.gnome.org/desrt/2014/03/26/gnome-3-12-and-freebsd-and-
a-virtual-machine/) [3]
[https://developer.gnome.org/gtk3/stable/GtkCssProvider.html](https://developer.gnome.org/gtk3/stable/GtkCssProvider.html)

~~~
voidz
The only argument I tried to make, admittedly poorly, is that I notice a
contrast between how good they say they are for open source, and actual
behaviour from the developers.

I did not say or intend to say "good for them, I hope GNOME loses their
brand", well ok I did say that a little. So let me state it differently - that
many of their own design decisions also were against open (libre) source
philosophies.

~~~
Argorak
The product being free software doesn't entitle you to anything regarding
their project policies, steering and development.

It entitles you to a number of rights on the resulting product, nothing less
and more. And that's already quite a lot.

