# Re: The Path URN Specification - trademarks

Michael Shapiro (mshapiro@ncsa.uiuc.edu)
Tue, 28 Mar 1995 14:07:48 -0600 (CST)

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    From: mshapiro@ncsa.uiuc.edu (Michael Shapiro)

    Message-Id: <9503282007.AA12255@void.ncsa.uiuc.edu>

    Subject: Re: The Path URN Specification - trademarks

    To: jcurran@nic.near.net (John Curran)

    Date: Tue, 28 Mar 1995 14:07:48 -0600 (CST)

    In-Reply-To: <v02110100ab9cd62d56df@[192.52.71.147]> from "John Curran" at Mar 28, 95 11:11:09 am

John Curran wrote:
|Is there an implicit assumption regarding the relationship between
|the "ownership" of a given DNS domain and an associated subdomain
|under the "path.urn" space? Is there explicitly no relationship?
|
|It might be a good idea to have some discussion in the document about
|the operational and administrative impacts of this mapping approach.

Michael Shapiro wrote:
|I'm uncertain as to the content of such a discussion. Would it be a
|suggestion for the top level names (or perhaps even one or two levels
|down). How did the existing set of DNS domains get instituted? How
|would this discussion diverge from the (existing) discussions about
|hostnames?

John Curran wrote:
|The existing set of DNS domains are allocated based on policies which
|are currently undergoing legal scrutiny with respect to the trademark
|infringement. We need to consider before recommending the establishment
|of a second name space which will certainly garner similiar actions...

This is an issue I was unaware of. Can you elaborate on these legal
issues? Would there be trouble if someone used "kleenex" in the name
of a document? (e.g. /A/B/C/mymail/kleenex/msg.1) Is this only a
problem for DNS names? Is this an objection to even considering the
path scheme? Or is this a problem for any naming scheme that allowed
trademarked words to appear as part of the name. And even so, is this
enough of a reason to disallow such a naming scheme? When does trademark
infringement occur?

    --
    Michael Shapiro                   mshapiro@ncsa.uiuc.edu
    NCSA                              (217) 244-6642
    605 E Springfield Ave. RM 152CAB  fax: (217) 333-5973
    Champaign, IL 61820

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