On Fri, Oct 03, 2003 at 11:23:07PM -0400, Jaldhar H. Vyas wrote: > On Fri, 3 Oct 2003, Don Armstrong wrote:
> > When originally written, it was intented that the DFSG apply to the > > entire content of main.[1] We have (to my knowledge) consistently > > interpreted it this way. > For documentation I can still understand the reasoning but a logo? > A logo in order to be a a logo has to be very strictly defined. A long > time ago I used to work for Merrill Lynch. They had a thick book of > guidelines about how the logo could be used. In fact everytime we did a > website the logo usage had to cleared by lawyers. A comparison can be > made to a license. Just because the GPL says "Everyone is permitted to > copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing > it is not allowed." does that make any packages containing it non-free? > It is totally legitimate for the Debian logo to be much more restricted > than software or even documentation. Of course it's legitimate for the Debian logo to be much more restricted than software or documentation. But given that it's restricted, why would you want to include it in a package in Debian, given that we encourage people to freely redistribute and modify Debian? Knowing that this is the case, have you included a prominent notice letting potential redistributors that any changes to the webmin package must be accompanied by removal of the logo? For that matter, the license on the official use logo states that it can only be used if official approval is given by *Debian* for the use. That means that individual Debian developers do *not* have any implicit right to decide to use the logo, even in their own packages, without the project's official approval. The only permission DDs have in general is to use the logo in clothing. How you could have concluded otherwise while at the same time pointing out that Merrill Lynch had a very restrictive set of rules governing how their trademarks are used by employees is beyond me. SPI holds very little intellectual property on Debian's behalf; but the items it does hold are all very valuable brand marks. It's in the best interest of Debian's own name to protect these marks against unauthorized use, by either developers or other third parties. -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer
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