Comments on: Mozilla asks Opera to sign agreement before it uses its RSS feed icon

By: soma

soma — Mon, 28 Aug 2006 00:41:47 +0000

soma [URL=http://kimberlylee.blog.espresso.repubblica.it/] soma [/URL]

By: ipostanodat

ipostanodat — Sat, 17 Jun 2006 17:06:16 +0000

I say this as someone who has long admired Mozilla and Mozilla products, but the thing I find disturbing is how much Mozilla is sounding and acting more and more like a mini-Microsoft, complete with “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature” declarations and focusing so heavily on increasing market share at the expense of other things. I’m in the process of building a new computer on which I’ll install Ubuntu, and though my understanding is that Fx/Thunderbird come bundled with the system, I won’t be using either.

Personally, I prefer the old blue RSS symbol.

By: Daniel Goldman

Daniel Goldman — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 14:46:06 +0000

Asa has nothing to do with this, AFAIK.

By: Remmers

Remmers — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 14:40:57 +0000

I meant whatever made them decide to stop using the icon, which thanks to Frank, we now know was a misunderstanding.

Yeah, the “misunderstanding was” that someone at Mozilla decided to muscle around a bit

As for Mozilla’s behavior, they deserve to be criticized for this mess.

And finally, Asa is just a troll. Everyone should ignore him. Why hasn’t he been fired yet? He does more harm than good.

By: Kelson

Kelson — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 23:28:32 +0000

FWIW, the icon is back in the latest “weekly” build. (Incidentally, it looks the comment preview is getting confused by links to URLs ending in numbers.)

By: M

Thu, 15 Jun 2006 21:05:11 +0000

… because we all know that Opera is better than Firefox

Seriously, don’t take Asa seriously. He craves for attention, and that’s what you give him.

Just remember where things would be without Opera, Firefox, Safari and Konqueror - in a land of IE.

By: Daniel Goldman

Daniel Goldman — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 20:35:49 +0000

Please let’s keep the Opera-Firefox flaming down! It serves no purpose

By: el_esponjoso

el_esponjoso — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 20:28:48 +0000

Now Asa is a good boy, ???????
His criticisms are more unfairly than fairly based in half-trusts, flame comments and bad pranks; his “criticisms” are really attacks to Opera and his posts prove this (http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/asa/archives.html):

If mozilla wants websites and vendors adopts its ugly orange icon then why complicate all this with trademark issues? Was not enough only publish and promote the guidelines of the use of this icon?
If the trademark yet has not been approved then why ask an agreement before its consent as Mozilla’s trademark,????

By: Kelson

Kelson — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 17:34:26 +0000

To respond to Meh,

Mozilla is behaving more and more like an abusive monopolist

Examples, please? I'd like to hear about how Mozilla has tried to lock other browsers out of the market. And I mean the Mozilla Foundation, Corporation, or mainstream community, not the lunatic fringe among its fans. You wouldn't want people to judge Opera by its zealots, would you?

What do you mean “made them balk”?

I meant whatever made them decide to stop using the icon, which thanks to Frank, we now know was a misunderstanding.

Mozilla people like the Asa troll have rallied his troops against Opera for lesser mistakes than this one.

No, Mozilla people like Asa have at times been critical of Opera (sometimes fairly, sometimes unfairly), at which point Opera fans have taken offense, Mozilla fans have gone on the defense, things have escalated and turned nasty on both sides and exploded into massive flame wars. Why? Because people have made up their mind that the "other browser" is the enemy, and therefore not to be trusted. (Something to keep in mind: if you perceive an attack, and retaliate in full force, people will fight back whether the first "attack" was intentional or not.) Sorry to contradict your worldview, but Mozilla is not the evil entity you seem to think it is. They're fighting for an open web just like you are, and there is room for both browsers in a truly, but civilly competitive market.

By: Meh

Meh — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 07:36:56 +0000

Kelson…

“Funny how things get less sinister as we get more information.”

They might get “less sinister” if you haven’t followed Mozilla’s previous adventures, but the fact is that Mozilla is behaving more and more like an abusive monopolist, even though it isn’t even close to having a monopoly anywhere. However, it has hordes of fans that never question it and think of Mozilla as infallible.

“I still want to know what Opera was asked to agree to that made them balk”

What do you mean “made them balk”? This is what Opera said:

“We fully respect their rights to the icon and will not use it as long as this isn’t sorted out.”

Where does the “balking” happen?

Face it, Mozilla took someone else’s work and started making demands, apparently only to a few select entities. It might have been a mistake, but Mozilla people like the Asa troll have rallied his troops against Opera for lesser mistakes than this one. Mozilla needs to get its **** together before it starts threatening others, especially its competitors.

By: Frank Hecker

Frank Hecker — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 21:18:08 +0000

Some quick comments on the feed icon issue: First, I've got proposed usage guidelines and a draft FAQ published on my blog. Regarding the trademark licensing arrangements previously proposed, the draft licensing arrangements coupled royalty-free use of the icon with acceptance of certain terms and conditions, mainly involving compliance with usage guidelines. No particular organization was singled out as needing special terms. We ultimately decided to change the proposed approach, not because any particular vendor complained but rather because of a general concern that doing a formal license was overkill in terms of the end goal of promoting use of the icon. When we decided to change the approach we had some miscommunication in terms of informing all the people we'd previously talked to as to what was going on, hence the confusion you've seen (and for which I apologize).

By: Kelson

Kelson — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 17:32:42 +0000

I’ve been jumping around on this topic, so I’ve lost track of where I found the link (I’ve got about 15 tabs open in 2 browsers right now), but Mozilla’s Frank Hecker has posted another update. Funny how things get less sinister as we get more information.

I still want to know what Opera was asked to agree to that made them balk, though—assuming, of course, that it got to the point of actual terms, and wasn’t just Mozilla saying, “Hey, we’ll want to work out a usage agreement on that icon at some point.”

By: gandalf

gandalf — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 15:28:37 +0000

Mitchell’s next post.

We all can influence that future!

http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/mitchell/archives/2006/06/rss_icon_and_trademark_applica.html

By: Sohil

Sohil — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 13:48:45 +0000

Sorry, I’ll email you if any further questions arise.

By: Daniel Goldman

Daniel Goldman — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 13:33:05 +0000

Sohil, that page is only displayed to browsers, not to feed readers.

P.S. If you have further questions about it, feel free to email me. Let’s keep these comments related to the post subject :).