What does this claim mean from https://mariadb.com/kb/en/mariadb-foundation? Is it incorrect or is there a difference between the trademarks for MariaDB and the MariaDB server?
>>>
The MariaDB Foundation also holds the trademark of the MariaDB server and owns mariadb.org. This ensures that the official MariaDB development tree will always be open for the MariaDB developer community.
>>>

From https://mariadb.org/foundation how are these goals to be achieved given the trademark and documentation ownership (via mariadb.com/kb)? Note the claims about that one company won't control it.
>>>
The structure of the MariaDB Foundation underpins everything we do. No one person or company drives priorities, code, or shapes community. The MariaDB Foundation uses technical and legal means to guarantee the technology used by the world's largest database community will continue to be free in every sense.
>>>

This last one should be easy to fix. The "Purchase Developer Support" link on the front page for mariadb.org ends up at https://www.skysql.com/about/contact. Will others get a link there?



On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 12:34 AM, Rasmus Johansson <rasmus@mariadb.com> wrote:
Hi Jeremy,

You’re absolutely right that the trademark was owned by Monty Program
Ab. Now after SkySQL acquired Monty Program, the trademark ownership
has transferred to SkySQL Corporation Ab. Notice that this isn’t
updated in trademark registers yet. The acquisition was closed on
Monday this week and it was a prerequisite for taking matters such as
trademarks further.

The MariaDB Foundation and SkySQL are currently working on the
trademark issue to come up with a solution on what rights to the
trademark each entity should have. Expect to hear more about this in a
fairly near future.

MariaDB has from its beginning been a very community friendly project
and much of the success of MariaDB relies in that fact. SkySQL of
course respects that.

Best regards,
Rasmus

VP Engineering, SkySQL
Board member, MariaDB Foundation


On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 1:27 AM, Jeremy Cole <jeremycole@google.com> wrote:
> While poking around on the various sites (discussed at length in previous
> threads) I was left wondering about the MariaDB trademark. I was under the
> impression this was going to be owned by and managed by the MariaDB
> Foundation. It seems like it was registered by Monty Program Ab though, and
> never transferred to or owned by MariaDB Foundation. So, after the
> acquisition it is now owned by SkySQL.
>
> The SkySQL site's "Trademarks" page definitively confirms this with the text
> «The "MariaDB" trademark is wholly owned by SkySQL Corporation Ab and is a
> registered trademark in ...».
>
> So, I am left wondering what happened? Was my original understanding
> incorrect, or was this never properly followed through? While I would hope
> SkySQL is a good community member and would not do anything bad with the
> trademark, this does defeat a lot of the original idea with the foundation,
> by my understanding, and leaves a single commercial entity in more or less
> full control of MariaDB's future.
>
> Can anyone provide some insight?
>
> Regards,
>
> Jeremy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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--
Mark Callaghan
mdcallag@gmail.com