Let them be lost, who cares? It's not even a novel name, they just co-opted an existing word for their little gang and now don't want anyone else to use it.

Even Oracle, the chief lawyer-assholes of the industry, have basically given up on trying to own "JavaScript", and that at least is a uniquely derived term.

Users who don't want malware/abandonware. See more: Mumble.com and Mumble.info

There are plenty of names everyone can pick that don't namesquat on an existing project. I find it especially nasty if it's a FOSS project that gets its name abused.

Should I be permitted to fork Go an call it Rust? learnrust.com with fine resources to learn ru.. I mean go, no wait. Rust. Definitely rust.

I am a user of Rust and I am neither dumb nor little, but thank you for your kind consideration of my mental abilities. But I think you are the one missing the point here: it has to do with the stability of the brand, language and environment; I've invested a lot of hours into this and will continue to do so. Without the protection I would not because it could be gone tomorrow, basically.

Those are your words and I think you should own them.

The trademark process is there to prevent malicious entities from doing that. And in an environment where some brand has a certain value, there will be people that would want to infringe on it to have a share of the proceeds. Why else are we even having this conversation, if it wasn't for the fact that people _do_ want to infringe on the brand?

I went with the Go example to make the difference bigger. We can talk about the Crabs Language instead; imagine they take that language in another direction. (I don't mind that at all, doing so probably adds to the community of knowledge and information so I'm all for it.) But now let's also call them Rust.

What does learnrust.com mean, then? Which Rust? A new users or a company looking to hire resources in this arena, would you call them dumb and little for not being able to expertly tease out the differences?

For one, any reasonable interpreter of the English language would understand that sentiment was being attributed to the foundation, not me.

And someone wanting to use the word Rust doesn't make them "infringing". It's a word. It's a technology. I can use any other technology name to describe an offering, but I use Rust and it's a big deal? Hard pass.

It seems to me that it would be educational for you to read a little about how trademarks work. The stuff that you direct at me has thorough explanations; these are not my opinions. To be honest: I'm not even 100% sure I even want the current trademark system, but I do understand the arguments for it.

Not really. How do you imagine this could work if it was true? It's a great excuse if you're looking to throw your weight around of course. Oh the poor Disney corporation had to sue that primary school for a bajillion dollars, or else they would lose their trademark. Does that sort of thing even pass the sniff test for you?

And it works out great for lawyers too. Instead of only getting paid when there's actual controversy that needs their skills, they can collect a fee for this "protection" work.

That doesn't mean one should rabidly go after every single possible infringing use, obviously, which is what the infamous drafted Rust policy kinda did. It's one of those things that are just not black and white, because laws say one thing ("be harsh all of the time") and actual mores around enforcement say another ("leave people alone when they're clearly in good faith").

Can they? Give me examples of such trademarks being lost.

Do make sure to check your examples. Maybe you heard say that Xerox lost their trademark. Nope, Xerox® is still a registered trademark of Xerox.

> That doesn't mean one should rabidly go after every single possible infringing use

If this protection is somehow mandatory, why not? How do I check whether I'm "protecting" a trademark enough? Maybe there's a meter somewhere? Is there a scale? What are the units of trademark protection? If there was such a rule, we'd have answers to these questions. There is no such rule.

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

You might want to check your blood pressure.

I think that it is fair that someone defends their name and brand and I definitely wish that you be permitted to do so, so that someone is unable to be too untoward to your business.

They aren't using trademark to defend against malicious actors. They're using trademark to segregate and divide the Rust community into those who are "officially part of the Rust community" (their words) and those who aren't.