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Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

andre.arko.net

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Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#11

Post by jillesvangurp »

mijoharas wrote: post #2

Interesting. > I have registered my existing trademark on the Bundler project. As all of this was happening I had wondered if there was going to be some kind of copyright dispute, but I guess it's gonna be trademark based. Does anyone have any insights into how this might play out? How do trademark disputes tend to happen? (I assume this is in the US?)

After fifteen years of not enforcing the trademark, a common legal interpretation in case of a conflict would be to consider the trademark genericized or abandoned. Which means any trademark owners apparently were not interested in enforcing their trademarks and effectively abandoned their rights.

Of course this is not guaranteed and just a common interpretation of trademark law by judges in trademark related cases. In case of conflicts, the trademark owner would be unlikely to win for this reason if a defendent can argue that the trademark was abandoned for years.

Oracle is in the same boat with Javascript. Technically they own the trademark. But world+dog has been using that trademark freely without them doing anything about it. So, their claims to the trademark are weak at this point. Hence the recent articles about e.g. Deno wanting to challenge their ownership of that trademark.

And you are right to call out the jurisdiction. Because interpretations and laws vary between countries and even between states inside the US. This stuff is complicated.

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#12

Post by testdelacc1 »

I sympathise with the author, I really do. He’s obviously put in 15 years of work on this, and he’s engaging in a thoughtful, kind manner. The action on the trademark he’s taking is measured, and necessary.

But I don’t know if I agree with the title. It says bundler belongs to the ruby community. It should, certainly. But right now it belongs to the rich people who fund the work on Ruby and Rails. That’s DHH and Lutke (Shopify CEO).

Whether the community wrests control from them remains to be seen.

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#13

Post by hn8726 »

testdelacc1 wrote: post #12

I sympathise with the author, I really do. He’s obviously put in 15 years of work on this, and he’s engaging in a thoughtful, kind manner. The action on the trademark he’s taking is measured, and necessary. But I don’t know if I agree with the title. It says bundler belongs to the ruby community. It should, certainly. But right now it belongs to the rich people who fund the work on Ruby and Rails. That’s DHH and Lutk…

> But right now it belongs to the rich people who fund the work on Ruby and Rails. That’s DHH and Lutke (Shopify CEO).

Do you mean "right now" as in _now that they hijacked the Github repositories and locked out the previous owners_, or "right now" as in _for some time now, since they've been funding some Ruby work_?

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#14

Post by spillguard »

draw_down wrote: post #8
sevg wrote: post #3

I appreciated the tone of this post. Not breathlessly inflammatory. Not longer than it needed to be. Just context, facts and actions.

[flagged]

From the guidelines:

"Be kind. Don't be snarky. Converse curiously; don't cross-examine. Edit out swipes."

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#15

Post by ericholscher »

Aurornis wrote: post #10

> I have registered my existing trademark on the Bundler project. Can someone familiar with trademark law comment on this? If I understand this post correctly, there was a merger between Ruby Together and Ruby Central at some point in the past. The combined organization was paying for some combination of developer time and server costs for the project. Can an individual member of this merger actually go register the…

Seems like this is the reply you wanted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45372303

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#16

Post by ciconia »

jmuguy wrote: post #7
colinbartlett wrote: post #5

Has there been any attempt from Ruby Central to undo the damage they caused? Can anyone comment on the current state of affairs?

Still waiting for them to reschedule the Zoom call they were going to do with the community.... something tells me we'll be waiting for a while.

Maybe they're waiting till after Yom Kippur? ;-)

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#17

Post by pavel_lishin »

eowyn wrote: post #9
colinbartlett wrote: post #5

Has there been any attempt from Ruby Central to undo the damage they caused? Can anyone comment on the current state of affairs?

I think this was the last statement from Ruby Central: https://youtu.be/VyCiE3GjQps?si=QgY1sa_w-59jJjQ3 This topic seems to be in a holding pattern now. People are waiting to see how Ruby Central responds. Some are hoping for the Q&A to be rescheduled or at least another statement

In this, the year of someone's lord 2025, surely there's a non-video version, right?

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#18

Post by testdelacc1 »

hn8726 wrote: post #13
testdelacc1 wrote: post #12

I sympathise with the author, I really do. He’s obviously put in 15 years of work on this, and he’s engaging in a thoughtful, kind manner. The action on the trademark he’s taking is measured, and necessary. But I don’t know if I agree with the title. It says bundler belongs to the ruby community. It should, certainly. But right now it belongs to the rich people who fund the work on Ruby and Rails. That’s DHH and Lutk…

> But right now it belongs to the rich people who fund the work on Ruby and Rails. That’s DHH and Lutke (Shopify CEO). Do you mean "right now" as in _now that they hijacked the Github repositories and locked out the previous owners_, or "right now" as in _for some time now, since they've been funding some Ruby work_?

The latter, they controlled it by funding maintainers. But the extent of their power and their lack of restraint in exercising that power only became clear now. DHH and Lutke don’t have the community’s best interests at heart.

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#19

Post by joshuap »

testdelacc1 wrote: post #18
hn8726 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But right now it belongs to the rich people who fund the work on Ruby and Rails. That’s DHH and Lutke (Shopify CEO). Do you mean "right now" as in _now that they hijacked the Github repositories and locked out the previous owners_, or "right now" as in _for some time now, since they've been funding some Ruby work_?

The latter, they controlled it by funding maintainers. But the extent of their power and their lack of restraint in exercising that power only became clear now. DHH and Lutke don’t have the community’s best interests at heart.

Funding open source work doesn’t confer ownership, but also “they controlled it by funding maintainers” is not true —- many other companies and individuals from the community helped fund the work through Ruby Together and later Ruby Central.

Re: Bundler Belongs to the Ruby Community

#20

Post by testdelacc1 »

joshuap wrote: post #19
testdelacc1 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latter, they controlled it by funding maintainers. But the extent of their power and their lack of restraint in exercising that power only became clear now. DHH and Lutke don’t have the community’s best interests at heart.

Funding open source work doesn’t confer ownership, but also “they controlled it by funding maintainers” is not true —- many other companies and individuals from the community helped fund the work through Ruby Together and later Ruby Central.

I believe the events of the last few days speak for themselves. Shopify has exerted absolute control over important Ruby infra. Shopify’s CEO? Lutke. And Board member? DHH.
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