By Luca Marzo on 2017-07-23 10:06 in Trademark & Licensing Team

First of all, we want to say a big Thank you to Marco Richter who served as Team Leader for the Trademark & Licensing Working Group for long time.

Since Marco stepped down as Team Leader, Luca will act temporary as interim team lead in order to rebuild the team, reorganizing the structure and conduct calls to recruit new people.

The Joomla! Trademark Team, formerly known as Joomla! Trademark and Licensing Working Group (TLWG), plays a key role in the protection of the Joomla! brand all over the world. The purpose of the team is to detect trademark and licensing issues and misuses and to take actions oriented to protect the Joomla! name and reputation.

Team’s purposes

The two main Trademark Team’s purposes are the following:

  • Protect the Joomla! name, brand and trademark against misuses.
  • License trademarks and domain names that includes the Joomla! trademark in their name.

Process improvements

  1. Ticket System will have 4 categories:

    1. Trademark Requests (assigned to Trademark Specialists) for new trademark applications and their processing.

    2. Domain/Website Requests (assigned to Domain Specialists) for new domain name applications and their processing.

    3. Reports / Complaints (assigned to TM Auditors) where users can report non compliant usage or report issues.

    4. Audit Requests (assigned to TM Auditors) where Liaisons can ask for a particular audit.

  2. Team will run periodically (at least once a year) some random audits to verify if a licensed use is still compliant to terms and conditions. Each approved trademark/domain use should be verified from time to time, in order to ensure a better and long-term compliance to rules.

  3. Team should have at least a spreadsheet where to record all the approved/licensed uses and keep it up-to-date, in order to allow all team members to knows immediately who is licensed to use the Joomla! trademark.

  4. Email requests should not be processed and users should be invited to open a ticket in the above mentioned system in order to track of all the requests.

  5. Create a short “Evaluation Guidelines” document for members to help them during the evaluation process of a trademark/domain name application. It should include references to the Joomla! Brand Manual and to the Trademark Licensing rules.

Team improvements

Trademark Team needs to be reorganized and well-prepared to handle trademark issues. The following changes will be applied:

  1. Plan and attend monthly Team meetings, held on Glip, in which team members can talk about operations, tasks and take decisions about processes and improvements.

  2. New liaisons: Joomla! Extensions Directory, Joomla! Events Team, Joomla! Template Directory.

Define new roles and responsibilities for team members. Each member should be involved in a part of the handling process.

New roles

To achieve a good level in Trademark protection we need to have some “dedicated” roles, instead of the actual “team members”.

  • Trademark Specialist, Handles the trademark requests: grants/suspends licenses. Support applicants to achieve the compliance. Update the “approved uses” list.
  • Domain Specialist: Handles the domain name requests: grants/suspends licenses. Support applicants to achieve the compliance. Update the “approved uses” list.
  • TM Auditor: Verifies if a trademark/domain name use is compliant to the policy and to the Joomla! Brand Manual. Randomly verifies if a licensed use is still compliant. Take note of the audits and in case of misuses suspend the license.
  • Liaison: Help integration/communication with other specific teams. Report potential non-compliant uses or ask TM Auditor to verify suspicious uses of the Trademarks.

Liaisons

  • Joomla! Extensions Directory Liaison: Reports violations/issues with extensions names and domain names found on JED.
  • Joomla! Events Liaison: Reports violations/issues with event names and domain names found during the screening of Joomla! related events.
  • Joomla! Template Directory Liaison: Reports violations/issues with template names and domain names found on JTD.

Apply now

Check all the open positions on the Joomla! Volunteers Portal, apply now and help us to build a strong Trademark Team. https://volunteers.joomla.org/teams/trademark-team#roles