This is a violation of Git's trademark, and your usage of it is expressly prohibited by their policy.

> [...] you may not use any of the Marks as a syllable in a new word or as part of a portmanteau (e.g., "Gitalicious", "Gitpedia") used as a mark for a third-party product or service.

> Please be aware that GitHub and GitLab are exceptions to this Policy because they are subject to explicit licensing arrangements that pre-date, and thus take precedence, over this Policy.

You might've known that if you hadn't vibe-launched this while for some reason marketing it as anti-AI, but here we are in a world where basic research is a dead art.

▲

clickety_clack an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I’d love to hear an IP lawyer weigh in on this, because I’ve never heard of this kind of thing before. It doesn’t seem correct that you can use trademark alone like this to extend beyond the actual word used in the trademark. Maybe it’s from licensing or something, ie maybe if a product uses the actual git product, then the git license means you can’t use the name as part of a word.

▲

baepaul an hour ago | parent | next [-]

thank you both for chiming in.

i will be honest and say that we didn't do our due diligence here (we simply assumed that it would be okay to do so, given the existence of GitHub, GitLab, GitKraken, GitButler, and so forth).

it does look like from digging in: https://public-inbox.org/git/20170202022655.2jwvudhvo4hmueaw...

that portmanteaus are prohibited by the policy that the Git PLC enforces, which as Jeff notes in his email above, does grant incumbent advantages to grandfathered names (e.g., GitHub, GitLab).

we'll reach out to the conservancy, ask for explicit permission, and if not, rebrand.

▲

applfanboysbgon an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Trademark law is ridiculously slanted in favour of existing rightsholders. The most famous example I know of is "McSleep Inn", which was sued by McDonalds and forced to change their name. I think that ruling was complete bullshit, because Mc is so generic and usually a prime factor of trademark law is whether the businesses operate in similar domains, but it goes to show how broad the protections can be. Something like "GitFoo", which is explicitly being used specifically on a site for hosting Git repositories, doesn't stand a chance in hell, and rightfully so because this is actually trying to take advantage of Git's name to market their product.

▲

clickety_clack an hour ago | parent [-]

They might have been sued, but did they change the name just to settle out of court? McDonald’s failed to maintain the trademark on “Big Mac” in Europe when it actually went to a court room https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/jun/05/big...

	▲	applfanboysbgon an hour ago \| parent [-]
		They did not settle, hence my usage of the wording "ruling" and "forced to change". > For the reasons given the Court finds and concludes that (1) McDonald's is entitled to enforce its family of marks that are characterized by the combination of the prefix "Mc" with a generic word; (2) the name McSleep Inn is likely to cause an appreciable number of the public to be confused by believing that McSleep Inn is sponsored, associated, affiliated, connected, or endorsed by McDonald's; and (3) the adoption and use by Quality International of the name McSleep Inn was a deliberate attempt to benefit by the good will and reputation of McDonald's. Therefore, the Court will find trademark infringement, unfair competition, and dilution under the Illinois statute (Ill.Rev.Stat. Ch. 140, § 22). https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/6... I suppose it's not surprising that Europe is less favorable to frivolous trademark claims made by American corporations than America is.

▲

pdimitar an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I mean OK, valid, and they really should get on it.

But you are squinting really hard if you equate "programmers not being good lawyers" with "they obviously vibe-launched the product".

▲

dvt an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[flagged]

▲

rfgplk an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Git is open source/public domain. Trademarks don't apply to it.

	▲	applfanboysbgon an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		> Git is open source/public domain. Trademarks don't apply to it. Public domain and open source are two completely unrelated concepts. If open source were public domain, you could not license usage of it (MIT, GPL, etc.). What is the point of confidently asserting something you're completely ignorant about as though it were factual?
	▲	latexr 44 minutes ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		That’s not right. You can very much apply trademarks to open-source software. See for example Mozilla Firefox. Also, open-source and public domain are not the same thing. Finally, git is GPL.