Ungoogled-chromium: Renaming the project to protect it legally (continued)

[Eloston]

This is a follow-up for #738. Please see https://github.com/Eloston/ungoogled-chromium/issues/759#issuecomment-493640088 for the latest status of this issue.

[tangalbert919]

I have to assume the organization "ungoogled-software" will be renamed to "uncloudium" then, right? Or is that going to end up being "uncloudium-software"?

EDIT: I would just like to know because I am currently doing that first one right now.

[Eloston]

@tangalbert919 Yes, ungoogled-software will be renamed to uncloudium

[ghost]

I want to express my dissagreement even if no one else does (though 71% are against too! ???). I think poll wasn't set up well and unintentionally allowed to disadvantage other suggestions. I am askinking you to reconsider @Eloston and make a new voting poll rather than picking a name that has only 16% of votes. Please consider that 71% of people don't like it either. When more people voted for option other than uncloudium and detachium they should have been immediately replaced with other names with most votes in this case Pristine and Ferrochrome and so on if those would be again outvoted by "other", but those two were and still are there as only two options even thought 71% voted against them. I think problem was that many people probably voted for their own suggestion not clearly knowing all available, otherwise they might have voted differently. For example I voted for my own suggestion Chromite but than when I saw results I also voted for Pristine because I liked it and multiple options were allowed.
I don't blame you @Eloston - it is not an easy task but you should fix this problem since you decided to have us all vote otherwise you could just name it "Eloston" which I think is more suitable than uncloudium. As to a manipulation regarding name "Pristine" you could explain with details so we can recommend how to prevent that.
I don't think 16% is enough to choose a name. I though it wasn't imminently time sensitive issue and imagined voting will take longer and chosen name should have more than 50% of votes.
And I don't think uncloudium is very relevant since it's browser not cloud storage related service, even thought I know how it was meant - it looks like it is some kind of airgapped browser which by definition wouldn't work since internet is basically one big cloud. I wish we could discuss this more.
UPDATE: And lastly I have also few more original suggestions worth voting for.
UPDATE 2: I noticed that you wrote: "Based on the most popular result ....., I have decided upon the name uncloudium." However ironically most popular result was "OTHER" not uncloudium and roughly 18 days to vote is little bit too little.

[ghost]

Also there is a company called Cloudium Software https://cloudium.io and https://cloudium.net - so I am not sure if it won't cause any legal trouble.
UPDATE: Don't want to sound mean but I found other companies: https://www.cloudium.jp/ and https://www.cloudium.co.kr so I really don't understand how is this a good option from legal standpoint especially since there were more original ideas... it might as well have been simply called unchromium since just adding a prefix to already existing copyrighted name seems to suddenly not be bothering.

[emanruse]

Why not simply ask Google publicly if they have any issues with the name of your project and only if they do, then change it?

Simply: Because an answer to such question has no legal value. Only a license can protect the licensee. Also considering that Google's license already forbids using the name Google, that question actually has an answer. So your interpretation of "waste of time" is quite wrong because if Google decides to cause trouble the whole project may be destroyed and then the wasted time will be the whole time @Eloston and others have spend on the project. Of course wasted time would not be the only issue because there will surely be legal penalties.

So @yilmi I would recommend you familiarize yourself with legal matters a little bit before making grand conclusions about "killing the project" or "great waste of time".

[nikolowry]

@emanruse I'm curious how this would go if they ever did take legal action. "Google" is trademarked, but "google", "googled" and/or "googling" are listed as verbs on the following dictionaries:

• https://www.dictionary.com/browse/google
• https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/google
• https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/google
• https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/google

It might seem like semantics, but the casing and word type is what would be scrutinized.

---

I know I'm late to this renaming party, but I really loved the name "Unobtainium" that @thermatk settled on for a similiar project that wanted to unblob the Android version of Chromium -- https://github.com/thermatk/Unobtainium

[emanruse]

@nikolowry

I am not curious about what legal action may result in. In fact I wish we never find out (otherwise I wouldn't suggest the renaming).

Playing with letter case and decorations around the main word is not a game to play with one of the biggest companies in the world. That's why my suggestion was to name it Zero:

• a word which is very unlikely to be reserved by anyone because it is a number
• it reflects perfectly the zero unwanted connections essence of this project
• it is also opposite to the megalomaniac googol/google
• short and easy to remember

But of course @Eloston as a creator of this project has the full right to name it to his liking. We must all respect that. My only concern with renaming is to protect this excellent work from potential attacks.

[emanruse]

I believe that if they want the project to stop using this name they will kindly ask for it

If Google could be so kind and if their words meant something there would be no need for ungoogling their products, no Dragonfly scandals or other things (PRISM, military, political etc). So if this should be truly ungoogled then it should not dependent on Google in any way, including on its benevolence.

[23rd]

What about youtube-dl project?
It has youtube in its name.
The project has been living for 11 years and so far the authors have not experienced any problems.

[23rd]

Well, at least we can cheat a little and use unggled-chromium for example. =)

[ducksys]

hello, i'm just a big nobody, well anyways, that name is horrible, please don't

[Gby56]

Hi @Eloston ,

I'd like to make the argument that, on top of this being a bit too hastily, it really isn't necessary, you don't have any commercial stakes in the project.
@23rd really pointed this out, youtube-dl has been around for litteraly AGES (from the Github API, since 2010-10-31....) so no point in worrying too much.

And my last point is that "ungoogled" has the merit of being explicit, instead of uncloudium, unobtainium etc...
I'd really suggest just finding another adjective/adverb like "untracked"-chromium, "pure"-chromium.

[emanruse]

I'd like to make the argument that, on top of this being a bit too hastily, it really isn't necessary, you don't have any commercial stakes in the project.

You mean apart of obviously opposing one of the biggest commercial names in the world?

@23rd really pointed this out, youtube-dl has been around for litteraly AGES (from the Github API, since 2010-10-31....) so no point in worrying too much.

The big question here is - are you going to protect @Eloston in court in an unfortunate case that is necessary. It is quite irresponsible to recommend being in a gray area just because there are many others in that area when a potential problem wouldn't affect you but someone else.

And my last point is that "ungoogled" has the merit of being explicit, instead of uncloudium, unobtainium etc...
I'd really suggest just finding another adjective/adverb like "untracked"-chromium, "pure"-chromium.

Try selling a drink named "antiCocaCola" or a computer named "noIntelzInside" and see what happens (especially when many will like it).

[ghost]

Please setup a new non biased voting poll without those two default options that will also include all suggestions from the old poll. There must be more and better names than ucnloudium which you can like too @Eloston. Better compromise for everyone. Hope you reconsider.

[Eloston]

To make things clear, I don't really care what name we end up choosing for this project. All I really care about is dealing with the legal issue, and settling on something you guys can agree on.

At this time, I will suspend the rename until you guys can settle on a solution. If that doesn't happen, I will stick to uncloudium. (I believe we can all agree that uncloudium is legally safer than ungoogled-chromium, while still being a unique name.)

@nunbit The voting manipulation happened because there was no mechanism in place to prevent re-voting. The mechanisms provided are not good solutions either. A better poll would require authentication with GitHub, but there are no existing solutions for that.

[emanruse]

@yilmi

If you are against renaming the project the only question is:

Can you provide a legal reference proving that keeping the current name protects the project and the developer just the same as renaming it to something safe?

Without such factual proof anyone can have all kinds of opinions and "2 cents" flippant disagreements but none of them can protect the project because legal matters are about facts and proofs, not about opinions. And the text of Chromium's license is a fact.

[ghost]

Thank you @Eloston for your answer and decision. So as you can all see people Eloston is up for a compromise so please stop arguing here about need for renaming the project and nonproductive comments, you won't achieve anything - maybe quite opposite. That question is out of a table and we don't need filthy word as google to be associated with this browser anyway, enough that this is a fork. Let's do something productive, I believe many of you have better skills than arguing. I found these maybe useful resources someone could use for poll:
https://github.com/adambutler/poll
https://github.com/apex/gh-polls
https://www.producthunt.com/posts/github-polls
Or as a worst option I could think of creating temporary Telegram group for voting.
NOTE: I think multiple options and also an option to change the vote should be present in the new poll but limited per a github account I believe this setup would be generous and fair so no one have to feel the need to cheat.
UPDATE: this: http://poll.gitrun.com/ with github account authentication, but it seems to support only yes or no...

[subsign]

I spent some time looking into this and hope what I've found will be of some use to some of you.

A lot of the information comes from http://fossmarks.org/. I was really happy to have found them because it meant I could delete my frankenstein mishmash of copy-pasta and you get to understand what this is all about! The FOSSmarks repo is here and the authors here.

I've kept my own input to a minimum to avoid making a mistake and instead briefly quoted from the FOSSmarks site. It's important that you fully read the guide in order to grasp the concepts below and that you understand that context is important.

This FOSSmarks website serves as your guide, from the basics of what a trademark is, to tips on choosing a name, registering a name, and what to do if someone uses your name without permission. This resource is useful to those just starting out, but is also helpful for mature projects.

Choosing a Name

A project "name" isn't necessarily a trademark – it might just be a term used to describe a technology, for example "rpm" (which started out as a Red Hat trademark) or "html." Some countries have the concept of a "software title," which is a legal form also entitled to some protection from confusion. For our purposes we will assume that every project name will be a trademark, now or later.

The goal is to pick a name that won't be confused with anyone else's name for their software or related goods and services: that is, you want to pick a name that won't infringe the existing rights of others.

• If the project is a fork, or related to other software, be careful about using a name too close to the original
  
  
  
  • An example of a good naming choice for a new fork is the fork of Hudson called Jenkins, which has the same English butler feel as Hudson but sounds and looks different.
  
  
  • An example of what didn't go so well was Nevernote, a Linux version of Evernote, but Evernote wasn't so happy with the name and Nevernote is now Nixnote.
  
  

Some Additional Considerations

If you just need a name for a new project and you don't know what the future may bring, there is probably a low risk in adopting a name casually. If your project isn't commercialized, most likely it won't be a high priority target even if someone believes the name is infringing.

A Growing Project

At some point it would be difficult to change the name throughout your entire project if you receive a complaint from someone claiming you are infringing. With a growing user and contributor base, it makes sense to have more assurance you can use your name into the foreseeable future.

Here FOSSmarks explains that in some cases a company might not take action at all:

To Be Permissive or Not?

Given you are a free software project, you probably will be more permissive with your trademarks than other right owners. Typically, you will want to encourage free and open dissemination of your original software under its name. So, even though sometimes you may have the legal right to stop others from making copies of your software and distributing them, in a commercial setting you will probably not want to stop that use. There may also be a point where enforcement of trademark rights will be a breach of the FOSS license, but we do not know where that line might be.

The following resources refer to actual cases argued in court. I found the case regarding Nominative Use to be most relevant here.

The Open Source Casebook, found on Google Open Source refers to cases of trademark use and misuse in open source.

Fair Use Defense to Trademark Infringement: Nominative Use

In trademark law, nominative use is one of the most important balances between consumer protection and free expression. Nominative use permits the use of a trademark – even in commercial contexts – if it is the most accurate way to refer to a good or service without misleading consumers as to its source.

Project forking’s naming conventions are another area of possible nominative use, although it remains a gray area. 53 Consider how, when you fork an original project on GitHub, the result is that you have a different version of the source code from that project copied into your own account at a URL which probably reads “github.com/[yourusername]/[originalprojectname].” The original project name could conceivably be trademarked. Does this mean that all other users should be prevented from forking that project, or that they should have to fork it with a changed project name?

A case involving Mozilla:

Mozilla's trademark enforcement experience

Anthonia Ghalamkarizadeh's talk at the 2013 Free Software Legal and Licensing Workshop concerned her work fighting against infringements of Mozilla's trademarks; Anthonia is a lawyer at Hogan Lovells International LLP, a company that the Mozilla Foundation retained to act on its behalf. The talk also illustrated some of the ways in which trademarks can be valuable to a free software project.

I found the Mozilla Trademark Guidelines to be an excellent resource as the entire policy is human readable and it covers Firefox which helps in this particular case.

I've also seen mentioned in the comments that the project will be destroyed or that there will be penalties should Google get involved. I'm sure If it ever got to that point it would be over something larger than just the name. Even so, after reading all the information above it's pretty safe to assume you will be contacted by Google before any drastic measures are taken.

edit: it may help to add a disclaimer so it is clear that this is not a Google endorsed/official project. The following disclaimer is from the Google Open Source release documentation and it is required by Google that all Googlers add this to their projects.

Required disclaimer

Unless your project is an official Google product, you must state “This is not an officially supported Google product” in an appropriate location such as the project’s README file.
We do this to help set appropriate expectations for users of these projects. Projects that include this label may not be staffed like larger, supported products such as Android, Chromium, or Go are. Support and/or new releases may be limited.

Here's an example of a Googler using a disclaimer: autogen

This project is not an official Google project. It is not supported by Google and Google specifically disclaims all warranties as to its quality, merchantability, or fitness for a particular purpose.

[wchen342]

@23rd really pointed this out, youtube-dl has been around for litteraly AGES (from the Github API, since 2010-10-31....) so no point in worrying too much.

I disagree. Considering the fact that the main source of income for Google are ads: youtube-dl actually has a relatively small impact on their business model. However, a privacy-oriented browser which blocks ads and disables tracking of its users like this one, if being used widely, will have a significant impact on their business. In that case it will be almost certainly that they will take actions.

Think about why Google tries to control the web standards over Mozilla and their recent efforts to change Chrome API to prevent uBlock Origin from being able to block ads.

[subsign]

Considering the fact that the main source of income for Google are ads: youtube-dl actually has a relatively small impact on their business model. However, a privacy-oriented browser which blocks ads and disables tracking of its users like this one, if being used widely, will have a significant impact on their business

@wchen342 Would you mind elaborating on this please? I think you have this backwards. youtube-dl is infinitely more costly to Google than most forks of Chromium will ever be, least of all a bespoke and relatively niche fork like ungoogled-chromium.

[emanruse]

Today I looked at chrome://version/

It shows (top right):

"Copyright 2019 The Chromium Authors. All rights reserved."

I wonder what "All rights reserved" means considering that a FOSS software is copyleft and permissive.

Perhaps a deeper research is needed and actual questions put directly to "The Chromium Authors".

It is a good idea to change the logo too (and perhaps other "artwork" which may be potentially subject to copyright).

Overall this issue and #756 look like one common thing.

[bvierra]

Let me ask just one quick question, can the developers of the project spend the $XXX,XXX USD just to hire the lawyers to START defending against a lawsuit if Google decides to sue? If they are able to, do they want to knowing that the cost will jump into the millions and that Google (if they decide to) will have a fairly unlimited legal budget to attack them with?

If the answer to both of these questions is not yes then there is no reason to argue this any further, you should not use a name you are questioning may violate Google's trademarks.

[subsign]

It seems my previous post didn't get through. Allow me to further reiterate my point by providing more tangeable information instead of condescending and baseless psuedolaw.

I invite you to pick apart my previous post and the information provided below so that we who take the time to research can further this discussion based on fact and not by those who posit hypotheticals through unnecessary threats.

Github made it easy for me. Add my post above to what I've pasted below and now hopefully, we can continue with everyone clued in:

What is a GitHub Trademark Policy Violation?

Using a company or business name, logo, or other trademark-protected materials in a manner that may mislead or confuse others with regard to its brand or business affiliation may be considered a trademark policy violation.

What is not a GitHub Trademark Policy Violation?

Using another's trademark in a way that has nothing to do with the product or service for which the trademark was granted is not a trademark policy violation. GitHub user names are available on a first come, first served basis and may not be reserved. A GitHub account with a user name that happens to be the same as a registered trademark is not, by itself, necessarily a violation of our trademark policy.

How Does GitHub Respond To Reported Trademark Policy Violations?

When we receive reports of trademark policy violations from holders of federal or international trademark registrations, we review the account and may take the following actions:

• When there is a clear intent to mislead others through the unauthorized use of a trademark, GitHub will suspend the account and notify the account holder.
• When we determine that an account appears to be confusing users, but is not purposefully passing itself off as the trademarked good or service, we give the account holder an opportunity to clear up any potential confusion. We may also release a username for the trademark holder's active use.

Based on the above, @Eloston :

• Are you trying to mislead people into thinking you are Google?

• Is it easy for someone to confuse, accidently think it's Google based on the way you are using the trademark?

• Are you using the trademark in a way that has nothing to do with the product or service for which the trademark was granted?

You will be notified if any requests by Google or whoever are made to your account:

Guidelines for Legal Requests of User Data

In these guidelines, we provide a little background about what GitHub is, the types of data we have, and the conditions under which we will disclose private user information. Before we get into the details, however, here are a few important details you may want to know:

• We will notify affected users about any requests for their account information, unless prohibited from doing so by law or court order.
• We will not disclose location-tracking data, such as IP address logs, without a valid court order or search warrant.
• We will not disclose any private user content, including the contents of private repositories, without a valid search warrant.

We will notify any affected account owners

It is our policy to notify users about any pending requests regarding their accounts or repositories, unless we are prohibited by law or court order from doing so. Before disclosing user information, we will make a reasonable effort to notify any affected account owner(s) by sending a message to their verified email address providing them with a copy of the subpoena, court order, or warrant so that they can have an opportunity to challenge the legal process if they wish. In (rare) exigent circumstances, we may delay notification if we determine delay is necessary to prevent death or serious harm.

There was mention of copyright in the comments. Here's Github's DMCA policy guides:

DMCA Notices In a Nutshell

The DMCA provides two simple, straightforward procedures that all GitHub users should know about: (i) a takedown-notice procedure for copyright holders to request that content be removed; and (ii) a counter-notice procedure for users to get content reenabled when content is taken down by mistake or misidentification.

DMCA takedown notices are used by copyright owners to ask GitHub to take down content they believe to be infringing. If you are a software designer or developer, you create copyrighted content every day. If someone else is using your copyrighted content in an unauthorized manner on GitHub you can send us a DMCA takedown notice to request that the infringing content be changed or removed.

On the other hand, counter notices can be used to correct mistakes. Maybe the person sending the takedown notice does not hold the copyright or did not realize that you have a license or made some other mistake in their takedown notice. Since GitHub usually cannot know if there has been a mistake, the DMCA counter notice allows you to let us know and ask that we put the content back up.

The DMCA notice and takedown process should be used only for complaints about copyright infringement. Notices sent through our DMCA process must identify copyrighted work or works that are allegedly being infringed. The process cannot be used for other complaints, such as complaints about alleged trademark infringement or sensitive data; we offer separate processes for those situations.

A. How Does This Actually Work?

The DMCA framework is a bit like passing notes in class. The copyright owner hands GitHub a complaint about a user. If it's written correctly, we pass the complaint along to the user. If the user disputes the complaint, they can pass a note back saying so. GitHub exercises little discretion in the process other than determining whether the notices meet the minimum requirements of the DMCA. It is up to the parties (and their lawyers) to evaluate the merit of their claims, bearing in mind that notices must be made under penalty of perjury.

If the tech news, social media world doesn't rip Google apart for wanting to shutdown a small fork of their open source browser, you will probably receive a word from them first. If not from them, then from Github. If not from Github, by postman...

Oh wait, no one has your address.

Forgot to mention: I'm still not sure why I need to do this when you can just look at youtube-dl as a prime example. If you disagree with that, please, please, explain it to me. I mean that in a good way, I'd really like to know why youtube-dl is fine but ungoogled-chromium is not.

[emanruse]

[...] instead of condescending and baseless psuedolaw.

Copyright is not pseudolaw.

I'd really like to know why youtube-dl is fine but ungoogled-chromium is not.

There are many cases of program names breaking license terms and the copyright owner not taking action. That doesn't mean they are fine. It simply means the (c) owner is not loosing any market because of them.

As this project is a growing one and we all hope to see it become hugely popular, there is a very good reason to protect it.

[bvierra]

Github made it easy for me. Add my post above to what I've pasted below and now hopefully, we can continue with everyone clued in

No, Github told you how they respond to trademark complaints. They did not tell you how to interpret thge law or if the name could get someone in trouble, nor will they tell you about the law because they could be incorrect and that may make them liable.

To attempt to satisfy your question, let's quickly look at the Polaroid Factors (however at the end of the day I dont think the true legality of it even matters):

• Strength of the senior user’s mark. The stronger or more distinctive the senior user’s mark, the more likely the confusion. - Google and Chromium are both trademarks and are both extremely strong.

• Similarity of the marks. The more similarity between the two marks, the more likely the confusion. - You add 2 letters to the beginning of 1 of the two trademarks and hyphen the other one. The are almost identical.

• Likelihood that the senior user will bridge the gap. If it is probable that the senior user will expand into the junior user’s product area, the more likely there will be confusion. - The jr user (you) is entering after the sr user so it is not applicable.

• The junior user’s intent in adopting the mark. If the junior user adopted the mark in bad faith, confusion is more likely. - Attempting to use one of the trademarks (chromium) to tell the world, hey we are the same and you attempt to user the other 'ungoogle' to say but not exactly. You would be profiting from the Google trademark (not in terms of money but in terms of using their name).

• related products and services. - You are basing your product off of theirs.

I'd really like to know why youtube-dl is fine but ungoogled-chromium is not.

It is not, they are out there to make a quick buck and dont give a damn if Google comes after them because they will shutdown the service and be gone. They used the name specifically because of the trademark.

On top of that Google does not care about the ripping.... the RIAA does. This website does not hurt youtube or cost Google anything.

Now with ungoogled-chromium you are attacking Google on multiple fronts. You are trying to take away their clients, you are trying to block ads that they want people to see to make money, and you are attempting to trash their name (because we are not google we are better).

You may not mean it everyone of those way, but that is how it comes across.

The team also appears to care about what they are doing, they are trying to do this not as a quick get rich scheme but as a way to provide a better alternative.

Now the chances Google ever comes after a TM infringement, I would say less than 1/100000000000 UNLESS you succeed at becoming a better alternative or get picked up on national news... then I would say it's 50/50 unless whomever is making the decision had a fight with their significant other last night where I would say its 1/1.

At the end of the day if Google wants to actually come after you, they don't have to notify github or you first, they can just file the lawsuit. Now considering it is Google do you not think they have the resources to find out who you are? Even if they cant go after you for more than a default judgement do you really want to be in the situation where you owe hundreds of thousands of dollars to a company that probably can get whatever govt you live under to pressure you to pay?

The argument that its a small project so Google wont care is true, most likely... however it may not be. On top of that if you really are trying to make something that will be a good alternative why would you hamper yourself that to grow at all means you could become in legal jeopardy?

On top of all of that, you could get nailed for violating the the LICENSE of Chromium.

| // Neither the name of Google Inc. nor the names of its
  | // contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from
  | // this software without specific prior written permission.

you are using the Google name in the name of your software and thus it would be seen as an attempt to push that Google was endorsing it by US Law.

[Erudition]

The "bespoke and niche" is the salient fact here - ungoogled-chromium is not big enough to be noticed by trademark lawyers (and probably never will be), even if they had a problem with it - which they won't, because the trademark is not being abused here.

• You are not claiming the trademark as your own.
• The word relevant to the trademark is being correctly used to merely describe the project succinctly. If the name can't describe the project using the word google, why should it be allowed anywhere in the description? Can you imagine if it wasn't allowed in the description either? We would have to resort to innuendo to accurately describe the project. Hundreds of repositories on github would be a mess. If you concede that something like "without Google" is definitely allowable in the description, why not that phrase in the title, which in this case is merely a shorter description? If, then, "Chromium without Google" is allowable, then "un-googled chromium" must be as well, for it is semantically equal.
• You are not using the trademark to pretend the product is something it's not (Google's project), in fact you are doing the opposite - saying it is "like Chromium but without _Google_ stuff". Just like a brand like "GNU's Not Unix" doesn't cause lawsuits from the trademark holders of "unix" (even though they also have the thing they're _not_ in the name).
• "google" has, to Google's delight I'm sure, made it into the dictionary, as a common word. This makes the trademark genericized (like "band-aid" or "frisbee")- meaning that regardless of all of the above, the word is now allowed to be used anywhere without permission from the trademark holder. The name "ungoogled chromium" even uses the word as a verb.

TL;DR: The current name is perfectly fine, and suggestions otherwise are paranoid.
If you are still unsure, I recommend you contact the Software Freedom Law Center, who will likely consult on the topic for free. Otherwise - you may close this issue.

[emanruse]

@Erudition

The "bespoke and niche" is the salient fact here - ungoogled-chromium is not big enough to be noticed by trademark lawyers (and probably never will be), even if they had a problem with it - which they won't, because the trademark is not being abused here.

In a court room non-factual measures like "big enough" have no meaning, so trademark lawyers don't deal with those. They deal with what the client demands and what the law/license claims. In any case you don't know how big the project will become and how much it may conflict Google's interest. So the generalizations you make are not based on facts.

• You are not claiming the trademark as your own.

That doesn't mean you can use it in the name of your project.

• The word relevant to the trademark is being correctly used to merely describe the project succinctly.

That doesn't mean it complies. Similarly you can make a drink named "No Jack Daniel's Inside" or a car "Not a Rolls Royce" and pretend it is fine because it describes the product's essence.

So although the name may be correct as a description, it definitely uses the name of Google to endorse and promote a product derived from their software.

If the name can't describe the project using the word google, why should it be allowed anywhere in the description?

Because description can be considered freedom of speech. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to describe anything as a whole lot of dictionary words are used in trademarks. Yet a project name has additional implications (such as endorsing and promoting a product which the license refers to).

"GNU's Not Unix" [...] (even though they also have the thing they're _not_ in the name).

The comparison is not quite relevant because:

1. The actual name GNU does not contain the word "Unix".
2. GNU is not a "derived product" of Unix. From Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU

"GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix!", chosen because GNU's design is Unix-like, but differs from Unix by being free software and containing no Unix code."

• "google" has, to Google's delight I'm sure, made it into the dictionary, as a common word. This makes the trademark genericized (like "band-aid" or "frisbee")- meaning that regardless of all of the above, the word is now allowed to be used anywhere without permission from the trademark holder.

If you make a search engine of your own and name it Google you will see this is not quite the case.

TL;DR: The current name is perfectly fine, and suggestions otherwise are paranoid.

Paranoia is a mental disorder characterized by systematized delusions. The license is not a delusion but a fact and it is quite clear - you cannot make a derived product and use the name Google to endorse or promote it.

It is amazing that people defending "sanity" keep arguing with facts by pointing out non-facts.

[Erudition]

@emanruse

So the generalizations you make are not based on facts.

What? You complained that my statements were generalizations, That is true. You pointed out the obvious fact that generalizations have room for disagreement. That is true. But that has nothing to do with whether my generalizations, as opinion-based as you think they are, are "based on facts". They absolutely are. As most opinions are. Sure, people could theoretically disagree about whether this project is "big", for example - but in forming those opinions they would have the same set of facts to look at (the repo size, community engagement, etc).

In a court room non-factual measures like "big enough" have no meaning, so trademark lawyers don't deal with those.

Of course they don't. We're not in a courtroom. And we won't be any time soon. That's the point you seem to have missed. We are not discussing what would happen in a courtroom. We are discussing whether it is even reasonable to worry about what would happen in the courtroom in the first place.

In any case you don't know how big the project will become

Hmm. It's almost as if we could wait and see, and then if it ever does become "big", we can change our minds! We're not locked into anything forever.

and how much it may conflict Google's interest.

Actually anyone rather familiar with Google _does_ have a pretty strong idea of how much it does[n't] conflict with Google's "interest", especially if you know why Chromium was kept separate from Chrome in the first place.

That doesn't mean you can use it in the name of your project.

Yes, it does. Or rather, the collection of negatives I stated, collectively _do_ mean that. That was the point of responding to the legal argument's list. Anyway, using a word derived from "google" does not necessarily count as "using the trademark" to begin with.

That doesn't mean it complies. Similarly you can make a drink named "No Jack Daniel's Inside" or a car "Not a Rolls Royce" and pretend it is fine because it describes the product's essence. So although the name may be correct as a description, it definitely uses the name of Google to endorse and promote a product derived from their software.

Again you are just rebutting with a contradiction instead of evidence. Which is kinda cyclical because I responded to "it could be illegal to use google in the name" with "here's a list of things that could possibly make it illegal, and it meets none of them" and yet you're responding with "well each one of those things individually does not on it's own prove it's not illegal" (which is a straw man argument) even though I never said they would suffice individually. It was a list that was meant to be treated collectively of course. As long as it doesn't violate any of the things on that list, then it is okay. That does not mean that a single criterion not violated means anything by itself, which is the straw man you mentioned.

Oh and those examples you cited are about products for sale. If they weren't, then yeah, they'd be perfectly fine.

Because description can be considered freedom of speech.

The response to this is obvious. Names can too! We're talking about a github repo title, not a product. There is no reason to believe that a github project's "name" and "description" fields have different legal statuses. That burden of proof is on you.

Otherwise you wouldn't be able to describe anything[,] as a whole lot of dictionary words are used in trademarks.

Exactly! Same with "otherwise you wouldn't be able to descriptively _name_ anything (whose sole purpose is to contrast with another trademark-named thing). But your point about dictionary words in trademarks is irrelevant - a single dictionary word cannot be made a trademark, and a trademark that contains a dictionary word does not somehow mean nobody can use that word anymore, even in titles. It's silly to imply that's not the case.

Yet a project name has additional implications (such as endorsing and promoting a product which the license refers to).

Implications that can be immediately discarded with explicitness, like this project's description does. No one would come away from that thinking it's "endorsing" or "promoting" the company Google.

The comparison is not quite relevant because: 1. The actual name GNU does not contain the word "Unix".

Not in canonical form, no - just like "ungoogled-chromium" does not contain "Google" in it's canonical form either! In fact it's best described as containing "googled", the past tense of what is now a perfectly generic dictionary term, to which trademark law does not apply.

GNU is not a "derived product" of Unix

Not that it matters, but yeah, GNU is a derivative work. GNU was literally created by taking Unix and swapping out small pieces with rewritten code to slowly make the system Libre software. It is of no relevance that that process is now complete and they don't share code anymore - there were decades where this was not the case, and the owners of Unix would have had at least as much incentive do something about the derivative (had they the legal right), because GNU is _actually_ large and noticeable, unlike ungoogled-chromium. GNU runs most of the internet today.

If you make a search engine of your own and name it Google you will see this is not quite the case.

Another disingenuous argument. Is this project called "Google Chromium"? no. Nor is it called "Google" or "Chromium". No one is suggesting that it would be fine to give it any such name that would cause confusion. Avoiding confusion is the genetic purpose of trademark law!

Paranoia is a mental disorder characterized by systematized delusions.

Are you seriously... oh my. So I suppose anyone that is "depressed" necessarily has clinical depression, the mental disorder? If this is your first time hearing the word "paranoid" and you just looked it up, you missed the first part of the definition:
"Relating to, characteristic of, or affected with paranoia."
Things are colloquially described as "paranoid" when they are _characteristic of_ paranoia - which most often means an irrational fear or being unreasonably afraid of something.

Merriam-Webster

1. : extremely fearful
   "[He] was so paranoid that he was afraid to walk the streets"

It is amazing that people defending "sanity" keep arguing with facts by pointing out non-facts.

If the "non-fact" you're referring to is your misunderstanding of the descriptor, _paranoid_, then that might explain why you think anybody is talking about "sanity". Otherwise, you're gonna have to prove what you think all these "non-facts" are. And no, it's not "insane" to put amateur law theory-without-practice to use, to try to get a project to needlessly change it's name to something less descriptive simply because it's not explicitly written somewhere that "this name is definitely allowed and won't cause legal issues ever" - but it's definitely unconstructive and unproductive.

The license is not a delusion but a fact and it is quite clear

Even more disingenuous. You know perfectly well that nobody was saying the license was "a delusion", or that it was not "a fact". You know perfectly well there is a disagreement over interpretation of that license, not denial of it's existence.

you cannot make a derived product and use the name Google to endorse or promote it.

Well, good thing that's not what was done here then!
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Nominative_use

Or if you want it from the mouth of a lawyer, and in this case they actually were using the canonical form "Google":
https://webmasters.stackexchange.com/a/29022

[emanruse]

@Erudition

Your generalization that "the trademark is not being abused here" is not based on facts at all. The fact is: the license doesn't even speak of trademark. It forbids using of the name of Google Inc. to endorse or promote products derived from Chromium without permission.

Is this a derived product? - Yes.
Is there a prior written permission from Google? - No.

So this is surely a case which is against the license terms. That's the fact. Period.

The point you keep missing is that we do not want @Eloston or anyone else to be in a courtroom - neither soon, nor at any other time.

Your suggestion to "wait and see" is to keep violating the license terms and exposing the project and the developer to potential danger. This is simply ridiculous and you are speaking against the safety of the project.

• You are not claiming the trademark as your own.

That doesn't mean you can use it in the name of your project.

Yes, it does. Or rather [... more anti-logic...]

Looking at this sequence I wonder - who or what are you defending? The laziness not to change the name (which you won't even need to do)? Or your personal desire to keep using a name which appeals to you? How is that any good for anyone but your self?

Implications that can be immediately discarded with explicitness, like this project's description does. No one would come away from that thinking it's "endorsing" or "promoting" the company Google.

The license explicitly forbids endorsing or promoting derived products using the name of Google. Nothing forbids promoting the company Google = anyone is free to advertise Google itself (of course).

You seem so focused to prove your verbal anti-logic that you are forgetting to read and understand what is actually written (the fact).

Again you are just rebutting with a contradiction instead of evidence.

That burden of proof is on you.

Enough sealioning. All facts have been shown to you.

[yilmi]

I really love our opensource communities, you usually can discuss with a lot of people willing to share what they learnt but also learn from others. It's really a great thing, as long as everyone is honest when discussing, everyone wins.

@Erudition I gave up discussing with @emanruse some time ago, I don't think he's interested in discussing the topic at hand... It's just like democracy, some people are not interested in improving peoples life, they just want to be there spitting their rants for everyone to know that they exist...

@Eloston sorry to put you on the spot here, but could we get some closure on this? If you don't want to decide (which I don't have any problem with), why not put it to a vote?

I feel that we've covered well enough this topic for people to make an informed vote and pursuing the discussion further would be absurd.

[emanruse]

@yilmi

I really love our opensource communities, you usually can discuss with a lot of people willing to share what they learnt but also learn from others. It's really a great thing, as long as everyone is honest when discussing, everyone wins.

An honest person doesn't need to hide his thoughts. If you are honest why did you delete your previous posts?

@Erudition I gave up discussing with @emanruse some time ago, I don't think he's interested in discussing the topic at hand... It's just like democracy, some people are not interested in improving peoples life, they just want to be there spit their rants for everyone to know that they exist...

"Improving peoples life" or "democracy" does not mean not to satisfy the caprice of a handful of people who put their personal preference on top of everything. What makes you think I love to waste time to repeat again and again the same things? I would like to have the name ungoogled-chromium too but that is just not right. Remember that Eloston works and shares his work for free. He doesn't owe you the additional favor to expose himself to potential problems.

@Eloston sorry to put you on the spot here, but could we get some closure on this? If you don't want to decide (which I don't have any problem with), why not put it to a vote?

He already made a decision which is linked in the OP.

[yilmi]

I wouldn't be bothered admitting a "caprice" on my end, but the handful of people satisfying their caprice is, us here perhaps? That's also why I removed my comments, I wanted to step out and let other people bring their views and also because the discussion became absurd.

That's also why I asked for a vote to let the users community decide based on all the arguments that were exchanged in this thread.

Or

The owner could reach out for legal advice to:

• http://www.softwarefreedom.org/about/contact/
• https://www.eff.org/pages/legal-assistance

And hopefully with any of these two we can bury this thread for good.

[Erudition]

@yilmi Yeah, you have a good point, I guess I should have noticed that emanruse hasn't really been reading my messages at all, as he just made clear. I'm all for closing the issue, I just didn't want emanruse's misguided fear of legal action to go uncontested, lest it cause the community and the developer to worry about it more than they have to.

@emanruse

Your generalization that "the trademark is not being abused here" is not based on facts at all.

Dude. You simply don't provide evidence. Ever. You love to say my arguments are "not based on facts" but the reality is that I'm the only one that actually provided some. See all of those links in my previous message? Not a word about them. You can disagree all you want, but that doesn't mean that it's "not based on facts". repeated arguments != facts. Since you want to play lawyer, how about linking to relevant case law? _That's_ evidence. That's "facts".

The point you keep missing

What you meant to say, yet again, is "I disagree with your response to my point". That is not the same thing as "you missed my point". I did not "miss the point" that you want to avoid legal action, I deliberately disagreed with it ("We're not in a courtroom. And we won't be"), which is the _opposite_ of missing the point. Just because I refuted it doesn't mean I missed it.

anyone else to be in a courtroom -- neither soon, nor at any other time.

...and if you thoroughly read my responses, you'd know that I perfectly agree with that sentiment. But instead it's like you're stuck on repeat.

Or rather [... more anti-logic...]

Okay, now you've made it explicit that you're not actually reading the parts you don't respond to. I'm not going to play that game - when I debunk an argument of yours, you can't simply wash over it in the next message as if you never said it. So I'll make this so absolutely perfectly clear that a child can understand it:

Prove that the descriptive name ungoogled-chromium counts as using "Google" to promote or endorse this chromium derivative.

There it is, nice and straight, so everyone will be able to see if you completely ignore it.
_Promote._ _Endorse._
That's it. That's all you have to prove! If you're so sure you're right, just do it already. I've already presented some counter-evidence.

It forbids using of the name of Google Inc. to endorse or promote products derived from Chromium without permission.
Is this a derived product? - Yes.
Is there a prior written permission from Google? - No.

You missed one: Is this a case of "endorsement" or "promotion", which would therefore require this "prior written permission" in the first place? No.

Don't agree? Prove it.

So this is surely a case which is against the license terms.

You missed one of the premises needed to form this conclusion. See above.

That's the fact. Period.

Prove it.

Your suggestion to "wait and see" is to keep violating the license terms

No, go back and read it again - I said _we can wait and see if the project becomes big_, as big as you think it will, because we can always change the name later. The idea that we're "violating the license terms" is just your unproven opinion, not something I'm suggesting.

and exposing the project and the developer to potential danger.
you are speaking against the safety of the project.

P-P-P-Prove it.

Looking at this sequence I wonder - who or what are you defending?

I'll make it short this time: I'm defending that it's unnecessary and misguided to worry about theoretical future legal action due to the project's perfectly descriptive name. Clear enough?

The laziness not to change the name (which you won't even need to do)?

Well, looks like you already ruled out that one for me.

Or your personal desire to keep using a name which appeals to you? How is that any good for anyone but your self?

Hmm, looks like you ruled that one out too! But why stop there? Why didn't you try the obvious one, "Not wanting to see the project's adoption hampered by the obscurity introduced with a less descriptive and unfamiliar name"?

The license explicitly forbids endorsing or promoting derived products using the name of Google.

You put the emphasis on the "explicitly" and "derived products", even though that's not the part in question - the "endorsing or promoting" is! Are you setting up all these straw men on purpose?

You seem so focused to prove your verbal anti-logic

And you, to dismiss it - as if name-calling it "anti-logic" gets you off the hook. If there's a logical error, feel free to point it out. Otherwise, the points you ignored will be assumed conceded.

that you are forgetting to read and understand what is actually written (the fact).

The only thing written is the license. I read and understand it. It continues to not apply. If you have any good arguments for how it does, prove it. All we need is an argument for how "ungoogled" could possible be construed to mean "Google-endorsed". That's it! Stop repeating yourself and just prove it.

Again you are just rebutting with a contradiction instead of evidence. That burden of proof is on you.

This happened again.

Enough sealioning.

Um, that's not what that means. There's no fake subtle, humble, Socratic questioning going on here. I am straight up asking for you to defend your argument (that saying "ungoogled" is promotion). There is no feigned ignorance or politeness. In fact it's hard to stay polite when people ignore your rebuttals and then throw out words they don't know how to use.

All facts have been shown to you.

Ha. Good one. I'll let the audience decide if that's true. In the mean time, anyone reading this should check out the links I sent earlier, they're pretty conclusive!

"Improving peoples life" or "democracy" does not mean not to satisfy the caprice of a handful of people
I mean, _caprice_ seems like a good way to describe this bug report, yeah. Though the opener actually had good intentions. The defense of the current name is a logical response to the report being opened, so no that's not caprice.

who put their personal preference on top of everything.

"These people disagree with me, so I'm going to assume bad faith"

What makes you think I love to waste time to repeat again and again the same things?

Ain't that the question.

I would like to have the name ungoogled-chromium too but that is just not right.

Except it's just fine. No personal preferences need to be involved to come to that conclusion. One could _hate_ the current name while still knowing it is okay to use.

Remember that Eloston works and shares his work for free. He doesn't owe you the additional favor [of exposing] himself to potential problems.

Which he won't. Repeating your point doesn't make it any more correct, so please, if you have any shred of evidence that a name containing "ungoogled" counts legally as "using Google to _promote_ or _endorse_" (rather than merely _to describe_) this project, put it forward. Prove it. Otherwise, he has much better things to do!

[emanruse]

@Erudition

To keep it as short as possible:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/endorse

"2a: to approve openly"

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/endorse

"To support, to back, to give one's approval to, especially officially or by signature."

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/promote

"2a: to contribute to the growth or prosperity of"
"2b: to help bring (something, such as an enterprise) into being"

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/promote

"to encourage"
"to attempt to popularize"

The license text in question:

• Neither the name of Google Inc. nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.

• Is this a derived product? - Yes.
• Does it include the name of Google in its name? - Yes.

Endorse:

Is the name of Google used to approve openly the derived product? - Yes. (In a negating way, implying exclusion, but it is still used. The license doesn't say in what way. It simply forbids any use.)

Promote:

Is the name of Google used as an attempt to popularize the product? - Yes. (Again in a way negative to Google)

• Is there a specific prior written permission? - No.

So which name is safer and more compliant:

(A) Not containing the string "Google" at all

(B) Containing the string "Google" and relying on someone's interpretations to provide protection

I say in all situations (A) is safer. @Eloston is free to ignore me, to look for himself and to decide.

[Eloston]

@yilmi

If you don't want to decide (which I don't have any problem with), why not put it to a vote?

You are welcome to propose solutions to the problem that caused this discussion to happen.

[yilmi]

You are welcome to propose solutions to the problem that caused this discussion to happen.

@Eloston I just did dude, and before that, I also already did (if you read my full posts). So I'm not sure to follow what more you expect more from me here.

To be honest, I'm surprised to see how quickly you were going to change the name at first, only based on someone's assumptions.
But now that you have an interesting set of opposing views, you're not willing to make a decision, ask for legal advice or put it to a vote? I just don't get it.

I'm happy to contribute, but you'll have to redirect the debate a bit here to make it a bit more productive.

[xEIkiFo]

So much discussion over something no one here knows for sure. Google could take legal action against @Eloston or they won't. My opinion is there is a small chance they could take action so I'm for the name change. The name chosen should be one that will result in the least amount of possible legal trouble rather than one that sounds the best.

Unless you are a lawyer with experience in this area who is ready to defend Eloston in the event of legal action, please stop arguing internet quotes and advice as facts no matter how relevant they may seem.

[jstkdng]

We never know, google could send a cease and desist any moment. Also, the name should be trademarked by someone, that way we will avoid the problem the jade project had. Jade was a templating library for javascript but then some company decided tu use the name jade in their products, so the project changed its name to pug.

[yilmi]

@xEIkiFo legal is not black magic, it's just painful to consider what is the current state of the laws (cause there are multiple sources that could apply), what's taking precedence over what, what scope they exactly cover, what interpretation could be given to the words chosen to express it and what precedents exist.

So if you don't have experience, you might be missing the point, but you also don't require a law degree to get the right answer most of the time, as long as you spend enough time researching, listen to others arguments, and think with all the data accumulated.

That's why I'd say your comment would apply for both cases, unless you are a lawyer with experience and worth precising here, in intellectual property infringements:

• You won't be able to defend Eloston against a Google
• You won't be able to defend Eloston against trolls pushing for useless changes

But as I don't want to be misguiding here, I renew my recommendation to the owner.
Get legal advise:

• http://www.softwarefreedom.org/about/contact/
• https://www.eff.org/pages/legal-assistance

[emanruse]

• You won't be able to defend Eloston against a Google
• You won't be able to defend Eloston against trolls pushing for useless changes

And one should note the "subtle" difference between the two: the first one is legal action which may result in serious trouble and the second one is totally harmless (just like renaming the project).

[Eloston]

@yilmi

I just did dude, and before that, I also already did (if you read my full posts). So I'm not sure to follow what more you expect more from me here.

Specifically, I mean the problem of voting manipulation and unfair voting. Unfair voting is more applicable to voting for community-provided names, but voting manipulation still applies. If you could point out concrete solutions to these problems in your previous posts, that would be great.

[emanruse]

@Eloston

The purpose of a democratic vote is to come to a decision which complies with the law applicable to everyone or to change the law. It does not have the purpose of confirming that one person should keep acting against the law to satisfy a minority who think "it is OK" (which really means "it's another one's problem, so no need to sacrifice everyone's comfort").

So when someone suggests voting for the sake of demonstrating that voting is something virtuous or correct but forgets the above - it has nothing to do with democracy. It is a form of manipulation aimed to make more people belie that voting can overpower sanity.

Once again, please remember: if Google decides to act against you, none of those who are against the renaming will help you. They will just forget you and move on to "defend" something else on the web.

[Erudition]

@emanruse

I say in all situations (A) is safer.

Yes, it is "safer"

Finally we can agree on something. Sure, you could definitely say it's safer! It's safer like a driver wearing a flotation device in addition to his seatbelt is safer than a driver only wearing his seatbelt. It's safer the same way a person who knows 40 digits of Pi is "smarter" than someone who knows only 39. It's safer like Skydiving at 10,000 feet is safer than skydiving at 10,134 feet.

Shifting the goalposts

...But that was never the problem. No one disagreed that a name change would be "safer" - it's a matter of whether that additional "safety" is _negligible_.

But is it _worth it_

Actually, it's simply a risk/reward analysis - even if the risk wasn't negligible, it would need to outweigh the benefits - after each were multiplied by their respective likelihoods. For instance:

Relative utility of ditching the descriptive name:
-100 utils, because it really helps people know what they're getting, and doesn't require previous knowledge.
Relative utility of legal action:
-100000 utils, because that's scary and expensive for a free project (as others love to explain)
Likelihood of legal action:
0.001%, or less as this is unprecedented (and an overenthusiastic interpretation of trademark law)
Likelihood of better name being better:
100%

Bayesian Regret example

Basic Risk Management: To calculate the total utility, you multiply how much good each case would be for the project by how likely the case is to come about.
So, -100000 * 0.00001 = -1, aka _the utility of trying to dodge the hypothetical legal action is 1._
Then, -100 * 100% = -100, aka _the utility of keeping the name is 100._

Therefore, it is objectively a hundred times better to keep the descriptive name if we used these example values. Of course we won't all agree on the values, but we don't need to! In order to change the outcome the values would have to be so different that they cause the dominant outcome to switch.

Definitions don't prove things

"2a: to approve openly"
"To support, to back, to give one's approval to, especially officially or by signature."
"2a: to contribute to the growth or prosperity of"
"2b: to help bring (something, such as an enterprise) into being"
"to encourage"
"to attempt to popularize"

This is not helpful. You have simply moved the disagreement to new words. We know what _endorse_ means. Changing it to _approve_ doesn't make it more applicable. Regardless of which dictionary you choose, ungoogled-chromium does not _openly approve_ Google, _support_, _back_, or _encourage_ Google, and it certainly does not "_attempt to popularize_" Google. There is no reason to interpret it that way - and you're the only one who has. If you have proof or a legal example of it being interpreted that way, you were supposed to provide it - not dictionary quotes that have the same problem.

Thinking disapproval is just a type of approval

Is the name of Google used to approve openly the derived product? - Yes.

...still no. Sure, it's "openly", but there's no way that's an approval.

In a negating way, implying exclusion,

Lol what? So can I say "I love you" where "love" is "in a negative way"?

but it is still used.

So? It certainly doesn't prohibit all use!

The license doesn't say in what way.

Uh yes it does, you keep quoting it: to endorse or promote products derived from this software

It simply forbids any use.

Seriously? What's the point of everything after "to" then? You wouldn't need "you can't use the name of Google _to_...", you'd just need "you can't use the name of Google". Nobody is interpreting that as forbidding all use.

Is the name of Google used as an attempt to popularize the product? - Yes. (Again in a way negative...)

This is pretty ridiculous. You can't approve of something "in a negative way", that's called _disapproval_.

Anyway, if you actually believed that Google forbids "any use" of their name in a derived product, then you should have said that earlier, but you

[Erudition]

@Eloston
You are welcome to propose solutions to the problem that caused this discussion to happen.

To be clear, there was no problem that caused this thread to happen - it only sprung up because some think that some day there _could_ be a problem. And the fact that it didn't come up sooner is because if most people knew it wouldn't be a problem, you wouldn't hear from them, they'd simply _not_ file a bug report about it. It's hard to measure the absence of something... Even if 1 out of 10000 equally-qualified people thought this chance was negligible, you'd still only hear from that one, and you'd have no way of knowing about the others.

[Erudition]

@xEIkiFo
So much discussion over something no one here knows for sure.

That's not really a fair characterization. Lawyers sometimes have additional insight on the quirks from experience, but trademark law is not impossible for a normal citizen to understand correctly.

Unless you are a lawyer with experience in this area

That's an unnecessarily high bar - in fact, if you combine that with "knowing for sure", then even lawyers wouldn't be allowed to comment according to your rules. They're usually hard-pressed to say their interpretation is true "for sure".

who is ready to defend Eloston in the event of legal action, please stop arguing [..] no matter how relevant

Um why? That's a counterproductive demand too. If I suggest that you take immediate action and spend thousands to prepare for a giant asteroid strike that could happen tomorrow, would it be reasonable for me to say you're not allowed to object unless you're an asteroid expert?

My opinion is there is a small chance they could take action so I'm for the name change.

So you gave your opinion anyway...

The name chosen should be one that will result in the least amount of possible legal trouble rather than one that sounds the best.

Only if the chance of legal trouble isn't negligible. Otherwise you do undue damage to the future discoverability of the project (which you seem to have not considered). It's not about what sounds best -- "Rockmelt" _sounds_ pretty cool, but from the name you have no idea if it's anything like chromium (or even what it is).

[Erudition]

@jstkdng

Jade was a templating library for javascript but then some company decided t[o] use the name jade in their products, so the project changed its name to pug.

Where are you getting that from? Pug only says:

However, it was revealed to us that "Jade" is a registered trademark; as a result, a rename was needed.

... nothing implying the product was trademarked _after_ the JS project. Intentionally doing so would be pretty malicious. Either way, trademarked phrases are only applicable to commercial entities (you have to be selling something) and only for the specific set of products you list in the trademark.

[emanruse]

@Erudition

Your attempts to deny facts through lengthy "logic" and "precise" risk "calculations" mixed with totally irrelevant "supporting references" are simply ridiculous. Of course if you like to argue for the sake of it you can "prove" anything through irrelevant "right interpretations" supporting them with the reputation of "well known references" and similar. These are well known argumentative techniques. But at the end of all that - facts are immovable, so is the license.

[bvierra]

@Erudition

So you have now just blown any argument that you may have had on it

Only if the chance of legal trouble isn't negligible. Otherwise you do undue damage to the future discoverability of the project (which you seem to have not considered). It's not about what sounds best -- "Rockmelt" sounds pretty cool, but from the name you have no idea if it's anything like chromium (or even what it is).

You have just stated in writing and publicly that the entire reason for the name of the project is to benefit from the trademark of someone else that is in the exact same field (in fact the upstream for the project)... thus proving beyond all doubt that the name is used to create confusion in the namespace.

[Erudition]

You have just stated in writing and publicly that the entire reason for the name of the project is to benefit from the trademark of someone else

Hmm, sounds like you need to read more of the previous messages in this thread. That's not what it means to "benefit from the trademark" (weird way to put it, but at least it's certainly more applicable than "promoting" it) and if "benefiting from the trademark" were the line-in-the-sand that makes it problematic, no one would be allow to use any trademark ever except in some useless unrelated way (and thus it would be useless to everyone). That's not where the line is, though. Check out the links I posted earlier, such as how Nominative Use works.

thus proving beyond all doubt that the name is used to create confusion in the namespace

...well that came out of nowhere -- no one here is arguing that the project's name is actually creating "confusion in the namespace", let alone that it's proven without a doubt. We certainly all at least agree that "ungoogled-chromium" is not a "confusing" name. The argument was simply about whether worrying about legal action due to the name was prudent and practical, or just an overly enthusiastic application of the widest interpretation of the law's potential limitations.

Oh, and

you have just stated [] the entire reason for the name of the project

huh? when? And more importantly, how could I possibly know "the entire reason for the name of the project"? I didn't name it! There's no reason to believe discoverability is the only reason it's a good name. I only pointed out that the descriptiveness is one such reason why the name is a good fit - the author may very well have had plenty of other reasons.

[csagan5]

I really loved the name "Unobtainium"

I find it a bit unpronounceable to be honest :)

I understand it might be inspired from the "metals" theme:
chrome -> bromite -> unobtainium

Feel free to pick something like that; we could even discuss about "renaming" ungoogled-chromium as Bromite, if somehow we could manage to merge the underlying projects as well (it's a separate and bigger topic to discuss).

[derlaft]

chlorine-unevilium?

[pirate486743186]

what about "unevil chromium" and "unevil software"? (serious proposal)

You know.... "don't do evil"? You throw their own words back at them. They don't want us to use the string "google"? Ok, the law is the law, just use the synonym "evil". ungoogle was such a great name, we are forced to change it to unevil. It's not our fault, we are innocent victims.

all google references could be changed to evil. For example instead of "qjz9zk".

an alternative could be "exorcised chromium".... or purified.... The description of the project could become "exorcise the ghost of hitler google out of chromium"

so.... the future logo/mascot of the project could be an angel... and eloston is the grand priest/ exorcist / shaman or what ever....

[jstkdng]

if we call google evil they would have grounds for a slander lawsuit I think.

[pirate486743186]

You are covered from that front. It's clearly a subjective opinion and rhetorical hyperbole.

not slander: Trump is evil.

slander: Hillary runs a pedophile ring with coded messages from her email server.

[pirate486743186]

beh, what about something like: "chromium privacy mod"

It's crystal clear what it is.

[MrTeeXD]

How about the name "Crowbar Browser"?

[webshaun]

What if you use the letter "G" in place of the brand name. "NoG" or "UnG"? That should avoid any potential legal issues, but I'm not a lawyer.

[Erudition]

an alternative could be "exorcised chromium".... or purified.... The description of the project could become "exorcise google out of chromium"

Sure, "purified-chromium" or "pure-chromium" are still pretty descriptive, yet opinionated, as it indicates that normal copies of Chrome/Chromium are not pure (kinda like "Pure AOSP" in the Android world - just vanilla android with no manufacturer-specific bloat or customization).

Still requires the prospective user to guess what the "impurities" are, though, if they don't know that Chromium is still Google-ified. But at least more descriptive than the other suggestions