Daniel, daniel(a)linuxaudio.org said: LMI is constantly looking at this, and we will consider any reasonable path that can be done. But please understand that I (Jon "maddog" Hall), have spent close to 100,000 USD of my personal funds, as well as another 200,000 USD of Linux International's money, defending the Linux Trademark around the world so that user groups like yours can use it. LI is broke, and so am I. OSDL and its corporate sponsors are not "taxing" the use of the word Linux. OSDL has loaned LMI (a non-profit corporation, with NO paid board members or staff other than a paralegal, who has to eat) money to try and make the protection of the word "Linux" self-funding. There is one OSDL representative on the board, which is reasonable since they want to make sure their money is being spent wisely and that we are proceeding to do 'the right thing', whatever that is. The rest of the board members are either legal or community. Linus gets copied on every decision, and can revoke LMI's authority to do this if he wishes. We are looking to expand the board, taking more people from the community, not from OSDL, and trying to get some non-USA input into this also. Again, we are constantly looking at trying to make this as low cost as possible, but when it costs 100,000 USD to file a trademark in the EU, the money has to come from someplace. I think there has to be some payment, as it costs money to administer the MARK, which is part of what the law says you have to do to protect it. If there was no charge whatsoever, then tens of thousands of people might try to register names "just in case"...sort of like URL cybersquatting. Part of protecting the name is keeping the namespace open so that legitimate groups (like yours) can use it. As I said, we are constantly reviewing this policy, and I will take your concern to the board (which, by the way, has only one OSDL employee on it). Warmest regards, md -- Jon "maddog" Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: maddog(a)li.org 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association, USENIX Association (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries.