discuss: Bento Poetic License (resubmission)

[Michael St . Hippolyte]

> [ Please discuss this license.  In particular, should a copyright
> license be used to enforce trademark rights?  -russ ]

Our intention is not to enforce trademark rights, but to protect
the value of our copyright, specifically our copyright on the Bento
Language Specification.  If a product claims to support Bento, but
in reality what it supports is an adulterated version of Bento, it
has violated our copyright, just as distributing adulterated versions
of a novel would violate its copyright.  It's an unfair use of our
source code.

We don't want to prohibit modification of the code, or even prohibit
use of any trademarks.  We want to prohibit a certain class of
modifications coupled with a certain claim.  The question is, is a
claim of support for the Bento language a use of the Bento Language
trademark or a use of the Bento Language copyright?

If preventing licensees from using a particular descriptive phrase
in conjunction with a particular use of the source code reads too
much like trademark right enforcement, and if that's a bad thing,
then it would be sufficient for our purposes to require documentation
of all unauthorized modifications, which is what the original
Artistic License does (and other open source licenses as well, I
believe).  But that's more onerous for licensees and users alike.

Michael St. Hippolyte
bentodev.org
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