Registered Trademark link to explanation

or even better point towards http://association.drupal.org/about/copyright and make a webform there with a dropdownlist for contacting the association or dries in person.

I support the proposal in #1.

I've posted some clarifications at: http://buytaert.net/drupal-trademark-policy-forthcoming. I'll follow-up with a trademark policy. Thanks.

closing, the current one is fine for this moment

"rela son now", how the association can use the trademark from dries is nearly okay, how this works from dries / assoc towards the comunity / corporations's is next.

bump.
Where is the application form we can point people at?
I couldn't find it here or at the association..

It does not exist yet.

Yeah...
What positive strategic advice can we offer "drupalmaster.com" ?

My own, personal advice is to give their brain cells some exercise and come up with their own name for a company instead of relying on somebody else's trademark. A permission to use it can be revoked after all.

Several successful Drupal shops exist and none of them have "Drupal" in their name or domain name.

Basically agreed - care to comment here?

We have no wrong intention behind using drupal as a name- originally posted here

My understanding is that until a formal policy is established, all trademark-related inquiries about the use of the word "Drupal" should be sent directly to Dries, as he's the holder of the trademark.

We have sent mail regarding this issue to Dries via contact form available at http://buytaert.net/contact and we are waiting for their response

I would concur with killes. Whether you intend to do harm to Drupal or not, it's better to not use the trademark in your company name. It makes you vulnerable to having the name pulled out from under you later, weakens your own position in the market ("what, these guys can't survive on their own two feet without leeching off of someone else's good name?"), and potentially creates confusion in the market place that would be harmful to Drupal even if you didn't intend it.

For your own company name, do not use "Drupal". Really. It's that simple.

There is no need to use a name that contains a trademark; you can use the same play on words between Drupal - druppel - drop, but it's better to not use the exact same name covered by trademark.

As per the policy described by Dries, there is a valid space for referring to the trademark in your company description without claiming to be the company. In fact, some use is protected, even if it is critical of the product. The line is very vague, but there are valid and fair uses out there. Even http://drupaldojo.com/ doesn't have so much as a disclaimer, and http://www.drupalmuseum.com/ doesn't have an official license AFAIK - yet I'm comfortable with them and their "fair use" of the word.

Whether "Drupal Master" crosses the line is a judgement call, but I understood from the policy that I could - if I wanted - be safe with "Kiwi-Drupal-Services" etc. That is appropriate, descriptive and non-leeching.

We all want to play nice, and "Drupal Master" is co-operating, but we can't be too draconian about this.
I'd like to think a good disclaimer would be enough. A 1-second search throws up a local distributor with a website registered as http://www.cokevending.co.nz/ and they haven't been lawsuited yet AFAIK. I don't think that the Drupal gang wants to come out as even more heavy-handed than the mega-corp :-)

INAL, IMHO etc.

This issue appears to have been superceded by this issue: http://drupal.org/node/616456, so I'm marking it fixed.