Re: [gNewSense-art] Query re Use of gNewSense Logo as Business Logo

[Sam Geeraerts]

address@hidden wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm setting a free software service for micro, small and medium 
> enterprises (MSM's) and am promoting  gNewSense as "the" operating system.

Cool.

> Can I use the gNewSense logo and related artwork as my business logo?

I assume you refer to the current "palm tree" logo. We have new artwork 
for the upcoming release. Not that it matters much which you use, but I 
don't remember Luis specifying a license for the new artwork. Luis, can 
you comment?

As for you getting our blessing to use it: I don't see an immediate 
problem for gNewSense with it, but I'll ask some people who might have 
insights on this. The Trademark Policy page on the Debian wiki [1] is an 
interesting read, though different from our case (no trademark).

> p.s. I realize that the logo is under GPL, however, from the word go I'd 
> like to work with the Free Software / GNU movement in general and the 
> gNewSense team in particular.

I hope you've considered the consequences of choosing gNewSense and its 
logo. Having the same logo will tie your business closely to this 
distro. There's more to that than free distro ideals and FSF 
endorsement. Practical issues like development resources or how well you 
trust the people that run the distro and its infrastructure.

Also think about the consequences of building your business on a 
strictly free distro. We have broken the graphical interface for some 
time in the past, and we may do so again if any freedom issues with it 
arise.

I like your idea, so I'm not trying to scare you off. I just want to 
make sure you know what you're getting into. :)

[1] http://wiki.debian.org/ProposedTrademarkPolicy