[Foundation-l] Wikipedia trademark being used incorrectly

Fri Nov 19 01:22:14 UTC 2004

On Nov 18.2004, at 16:42, Rowan Collins wrote:

> as Rich Holton said, someone uses the term for something
> that goes completely against our goals, or in such a way that our
> image is tarnished?

And you're suggesting that this would somehow be different if the 
reference was to a Wiki instead of a Wikipedia?

Wiki software is far from ubiquitous yet (at least when compared with 
such things as PHP) and exerts a strong personality on sites that it's 
used to build (unlike, say, PHPNuke.)

To my mother, there is no difference between a Wiki and a Wikipedia. 
The risk your describing is real as long as the foundation continues to 
use the word Wiki in it's project names. This is quite distinct from 
the situation with Movable Type which, to the media, produces "blogs" 
but can in fact be used for much much more.

I'm not suggesting this is a bad thing; if the goal is to promote Wiki 
software rather than the Wikipedia, it's helping. I'm simply pointing 
out that it's perpetuating the confusion.
--
Skot Nelson
skot at penguinstorm.com