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OS/2 Licensing
Martin Iturbide:
Changing the subject from Copyright to Trademark
Can we do something evil since IBM let the OS/2 trademark expire ? ;D ;D
- https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=74515112&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch
Maybe something like register the logo again and create own our legal T-Shirts.
Any Trademark lawyers friends around?
Roderick Klein:
--- Quote from: Martin Iturbide on January 05, 2025, 05:24:12 pm ---Changing the subject from Copyright to Trademark
Can we do something evil since IBM let the OS/2 trademark expire ? ;D ;D
- https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=74515112&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=statusSearch
Maybe something like register the logo again and create own our legal T-Shirts.
Any Trademark lawyers friends around?
--- End quote ---
A difficult question. This website might provide some of the answers. And it might also depend per country if you can use a trademark that has expired.
There are a lots of shades or grey in this discussion what is legal todo and what not.
https://harperjames.co.uk/article/dead-trade-mark/#section-6
So you want to use the word OS/2 or the logo's from IBM ?
From the website above:
"If the dead trade mark is a logo, the copyright in the logo could still belong to a third party such as the original designer. Copyright can last for the life of the author plus seventy years and you may have to conduct additional research if you want to use an existing logo and perhaps secure a written assignment of its copyright if you can locate the original owner."
Roderick Klein
jmase:
What access does Arca Noae have to OS/2?
Do they have access to source so they can fix problems or is "all" they get old binaries?
I understand that IBM has no interest trying to open all or parts of the code since there are
so many old copyrights but with a NDA Arca Noae should be able to work around that?
Martin Iturbide:
Hello.
--- Quote from: jmase on January 20, 2025, 11:13:00 pm ---What access does Arca Noae have to OS/2?
Do they have access to source so they can fix problems or is "all" they get old binaries?
I understand that IBM has no interest trying to open all or parts of the code since there are
so many old copyrights but with a NDA Arca Noae should be able to work around that?
--- End quote ---
As far as a I know, IBM did not share the source code of OS/2 with Arca Noae. For what I hear from Lewis, IBM licensed the binaries for Warp 4.52 and the SMP kernel of Warp Server so it can be sold as ArcaOS. I guess it is very similar to the agreement of IBM with Serenity System on the eComStation days. There were old rumors that Stardock didn't went forward with this kind of agreement with IBM on 2000, because they were not going to have access to the source code.
But the good thing is that the OS/2 architecture allows you to extend the functionality (at some limit) to keep it running today on modern hardware. The ACPI driver is a good example of OS/2 being extended for something that was not supported at that time.
I really don't know if IBM still has the OS/2 source code stored somewhere were they can access it. If there is any fear of IBM getting sue by Microsoft by releasing the OS/2 source code, I don't think it applies anymore because the IBM Microsoft Joint Development Agreement gives a 10 year period to maintain the source code confidential. If we count OS/2 2.0 as the last work the did together we are pass that. (personal opinion)
--- Quote ---For a period of ten (10) years from the date of receipt of Source Code from the other party, neither party shall disclose to any third party such Source Code of the other party unless such disclosure is made in accordance with terms and conditions regarding confidentiality substantially similar to those contained in Addendum A to this Agreement, entitled "SAMPLE CONFIDENTIAL DISCLOSURE AGREEMENT"
--- End quote ---
My dream remains on open source cloning OS/2 components file by file.
Regards
Dave Yeo:
To add to what Martin said, I think ArcaOS also got the right to reverse engineer and patch the system binaries including the kernel. These are limited to only being available for ArcaOS.
Neither of us are speaking for Arca Noae and we could be misunderstanding things.
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