I'm not sure which is company is dumber, Mandrive Linux or King Features Syndicate. From wikipedia's Mandrake Linux entry:

In February 2004 MandrakeSoft lost a court case against Hearst Corporation, owners of King Features Syndicate. Hearst contends that MandrakeSoft is infringing upon King Features' trademarked character Mandrake the Magician. The word Mandrake is not unique to the King Features character, and MandrakeSoft is appealing the decision. As a precaution, MandrakeSoft has renamed its products by removing the space between the brand name and the product name and changing the first letter of the product name to lower case, thus creating one word. Starting from version 10.0, Mandrake Linux became known as Mandrakelinux, and its logo changed accordingly. Similarly, MandrakeMove became Mandrakemove.

King Features upsets thousands of smart geeks by this. But what is their downside? Nothing. Nobody will organise a boycott or campaign against them. And even if the smart geeks to get organised they don't represent King Features Syndicate stakeholders. In what way could they influence those stakeholders to make KFS take notice?

MandrakeSoft were dumb for getting to release 10.0 or so without securing their intellectual property. The cost of defending the action in financial and management resources is inexcusable.

I haven't read the court decision, but it also amazes me that King Features can lock up the word Mandrake (which is a plant) in areas beyond their trademark class. Of course they may have trademark protection in the software class.

The point is now moot as

in April 2005 Mandrakesoft annouced that after the corporate merger of Mandrakesoft and Conectiva, and the legal dispute with Hearst Corporation, the new company name would be Mandriva, and that Mandriva Linux would be the new name covering products.

Chalk one up for the deep pockets of an old media company.

Ziggy

Ziggy's Warehouse

Ziggy's blog

I for one went out, only a few months ago in fact, to buy me a handful of Mandrake the Magician comics.

By accident, I went into the wrong shop - I was looking for 'Comic Shop', but went into 'Computer Shop' instead - and easy mistake that I am sure we all make on frequent occasions.

Looking around, I picked up a CD set labelled 'Mandrake Linux'. Now some of you might scoff, and say that Mandrake Linux cannot be mistaken for Mandrake Magician - sure, the colors are a bit different, and the instructions on the back do read somewhat differently, but in the heat of the moment, I honestly could not tell the difference between a CD and a comic book, let alone subtle differences in the colors of the packaging.

Unfortunately, and perhaps because of this incident, I went to catch the bus home, but accidentally got into an Elevator instead - another simple mistake, and I am sure all of you have done this on occassion as well. Suffice to say, I ended up on the top floor of a corporate office, clutching a Mandrake Linux CD instead of a comic book. I got stuck on the top floor of the building and missed my bus, and ended up getting locked in for the night.

Come the morning, I was dying of thirst, and very eager have a drink, and then to get home and read my new comic. Desperate for water, I found my way to the staff kitchen, and found the salt container. I honestly beleived that the salt container was a bottle of Dr Peppers, and proceeded to swallow the lot. This had an adverse affect on my thirst.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I ended up in hospital for 3 weeks in a full body plaster, and an armed police guard on the door.

I blame all of this on Mandrake Linux's careless use of a logo which looks very similar to the the Mandrake the Magician comic.

I am available to act as a paid witness in this case, if required, since I believe that my testimony would sway the most cynical adjudicator.

One more example of the companies trying to run off with half of the world's vocabulary. First we take windows as a trademark. Soon you'll have to remove them from your houses. Next they , then make a traditional and historical plant 'proprietary' (remove it from your garden?). What's next??? Air? Water? The whole thing's crap (probably proprietary too).

The most confusing thought is 'why any company would pursue this kind of litigation'? This kind of corporate action creates far more public ill will than practically anything else. That's not in the companies intrest so, what's the point?

This logo
http://www.amstelveenweb.com/mandrake.jpg

is what is got them in trouble. It is Mandrake's first logo that when this lawsuit started they dropped.

When Mandrake was first started they DID try to base their logo on the Mandrake the magician character. This is not a coincidence. They chose to emulate it. Amateur mistake that will cost the company big bucks. You can't do that anymore then I could create a Linux distro and call it Coke Linux put it in a red box with a white wave on it. Simply calling it Mandrake might have worked but the nitwit who approved the Tux/Magician logo made a big mistake.

Sorry this isn't a case of big bad company going after the little guy. The little guy deliberatly tried to invoke the image of an existing trademark. That is exactly the kind of thing that trademark laws are designed to protect you from.

From the Mandrake site, evidently Mandrake is still able to appeal the order, which could take three years. In the meantime, Mandrake doesn't even have to give up its domain names. Maybe it only means they have to pay the 70,000 euro fine for the moment.

This is the first time I had ever heard of Mandrake the Magician - this despite having spent my "comic book years" during the early 60's in the United States. Yes, I can remember paying USD .12 for comic books (the price on the above cover). So I personally find this to be a great example of Schadenfreude on the part of Hearst and King Features Syndicate, another example of the destructive hubris which seems to have totally infected the more "civilized" countries. I've heard "Mandrake Linux" for years, and never once connected it with a comic book character. I frankly thought it was an inside French joke that I didn't get.

Now, others disagree. One person has suggested that the confusion is probably due to some people having taken some mandrake root orally, which evidently has about the same effect as some high-grade Dutch cannabis. If this is true, maybe they could name the company "Purple Haze Linux", or something similar.