TRADEMARK POLICY

Last updated 5th April, 2022

WebThings is an open source project. Because we make our code available to download and modify, proper use of our trademarks is essential to inform users whether or not a product or service is associated with the project. When using WebThings trademarks you must comply with the WebThings Trademark Policy.

The "WebThings" wordmark is a registered trademark owned by Krellian Ltd. on behalf of the WebThings Community. For the purposes of this policy, "WebThings" is a trading name of Krellian Ltd. This policy only applies to trademarks relating to the WebThings open source project, and not other Krellian trademarks such as the "Krellian" wordmark.

WebThings Logo, incorporating the WebThings wordmark

If you want to report misuse of WebThings trademarks, please contact us at legal@krellian.com.

Table of Contents

When do I need specific permission to use a WebThings trademark?

You may do the following without receiving specific permission from Krellian Ltd.:

All other uses of a WebThings trademark require written permission from Krellian Ltd. This includes any use of a WebThings trademark in a domain name. Contact us at legal@krellian.com for more information.

General Guidelines

Do:

Don't:

WebThings Gateway Add-on Guidelines

In addition to the guidelines above, your add-on developer name and everything about your add-on (including the add-on name, icon, description, graphics and screenshots) must be unique and free of WebThings trademarks unless:

  1. You've received prior written permission from Krellian Ltd., or
  2. You're only using a WebThings wordmark to describe that your add-on works with WebThings Gateway and as long as your add-on icon and/or name:
    1. Does not suggest or give the impression your add-on is actually published by, affiliated with or endorsed by WebThings; and
    2. Denotes your own unique identity so as to clearly signal to users that there is no affiliation with or endorsement by WebThings

For example, you cannot name your add-on "WebThings NewGadget Adapter". However, it would be acceptable to name your add-on "NewGadget Adapter for WebThings Gateway".

Open Source Project Guidelines

The specific licence for each of the WebThings software projects and code says what you can and cannot do with the code itself but does not give permission to use WebThings trademarks. If you choose to build on or modify WebThings open source code for your own project,

You Must:

You Must NOT:

For example, please do not name your project WebThings [Something].

You May:

For instance, you may state that your project:

as long as you also include the statement equally prominently: "[Brand Name] and [Product Name] are not officially associated with WebThings."

Social Media Guidelines

In addition to the General Guidelines above, the name and handle of your social media account and any and all pages cannot begin with a WebThings trademark. In addition, WebThings logos cannot be used in a way that might suggest affiliation with WebThings, including but not limited to, the account, profile, or header images. The only exception to these requirements is if you've received prior permission from Krellian Ltd.

For example, you cannot name your account, page, or community "WebThings Representatives" or "WebThings Software". However, it would be acceptable to name your account, page or community "Fans of WebThings" or "Information about Webthings Software" as long as you do not use the WebThings logos or otherwise suggest any affiliation with WebThings.

Cloud-based Services

If you offer a cloud-based service that provides remote access to WebThings software, it is important that you do so in a way that does not confuse users about who is offering the service. You must not use WebThings trademarks in the name of your product or service.

You may state in words (not using logos or images) that your product or service features or provides access to unaltered WebThings software, if this is true. For example,

Acceptable: [Your Product Name] powered by WebThings Cloud

Incorrect: [WebThings] [Your Product Name]

Distribution Policy

What you can and cannot do with our software projects and code - independent of our trademarks - is governed by the relevant software licenses. For example, most WebThings code is released under the Mozilla Public Licence version 2.0.

The Mozilla Public Licence does not grant permission to use trademarks, as is set out in its section 2.1 "Grants":

"Each Contributor hereby grants You a world-wide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license: (a) under intellectual property rights (other than patent or trademark)…"

In the following, the term "WebThings software" refers to software developed and/or distributed by WebThings or one of its affiliates. If you wish to distribute WebThings Gateway and other WebThings software branded with our trademarks, you must comply with the relevant software licenses, this WebThings Trademark Policy and either the Unaltered Software Distribution Policy or the terms of a written distribution agreement with Krellian Ltd.

Unaltered Software Distribution Policy

You may distributed unaltered copies of WebThings Gateway and other WebThings software from webthings.io without express permission from Krellian Ltd. as long as you comply with the following rules:

Krellian Ltd. reserves the right to change this Unaltered Software Distribution Policy by posting changes on this webpage.

Modified Versions Require Prior Written Permission

The open source nature of WebThings Gateway and other WebThings software allows you to freely download and modify the source code. However, if you make any changes to WebThings Gateway or other WebThings software, you may not redistribute that product using any WebThings trademark without Krellian Ltd.'s prior written consent and, typically, a distribution agreement with Krellian Ltd. For example, you may not distribute a modified form of WebThings Gateway and continue to call it WebThings Gateway.

Changes requiring Krellian Ltd.'s prior written permission include (but are not limited to):

  1. Adding, modifying, or deleting source files
  2. Adding, modifying, or deleting content from installer files,
  3. File location changes, or
  4. Adding or removing adapter, notifier, extension or other types of add-ons

Branding Guidelines

WebThings

(upper camel case, without a space between “Web” and “Things”)

The WebThings platform is an open source implementation of the Web of Things (see below). This includes sub-components such as "WebThings Gateway", "WebThings Framework" and "WebThings Cloud".

Example WebThings logos incorporating the WebThings wordmark

WebThings is a proper noun and brand name which should not be localised.

A connected device may be referred to as "powered by WebThings" (if it adheres to the terms of this trademark policy), but it should never be referred to as "a WebThing". It should instead always be referred to as "a web thing" (see below).

web thing

(lowercase, with a space between web and thing)

A device connected to the Web of Things (see below). Like "web page" or "website", but for devices rather than documents. "web thing" is a common noun and may be localised.

No formal certification exists to determine whether a given device is or is not a "web thing". There is therefore no single authority who can enforce conditions on the use of this term.

However, from the point of view of the WebThings Community the term "web thing" refers to a connected device which:

Web of Things

The Web of Things is an application layer which runs on top of the Internet of Things in the same way that the World Wide Web is an application layer on top of the Internet. It refers to the worldwide network of web things using Web of Things standards, which are not limited to any single vendor. It may be written in lowercase "web of things" but is more commonly written as "Web of Things" or abbreviated as "WoT".

The open source WebThings platform is just one implementation of Web of Things standards in the same way that Apache is one implementation of a web server and Firefox is one implementation of a web client.

Usage of the term "Web of Things" is not limited in any way by this policy.

Questions

If you have any questions, please contact us at legal@krellian.com.