united-states trademark open-source-software
Can gratis FOSS projects have trademarks?
<p>I maintain a FOSS library as a hobby project. Does this count as using its name in commerce, or do I have to sell a copy to someone?</p>

<p>An exchange of money is not necessarily required for a trademark to satisfy the &quot;use in commerce&quot; requirement, and both for profit and nonprofit entities can obtain trademarks.</p>
<p>Simply maintaining a library, however, is generally not enough. You must show marketing materials that are used to bring awareness of the mark to a wider public. &quot;Use in interstate commerce&quot; is basically synonymous with either branding something that is distributed in more than one state, or marketing something in more than one state. Websites and anything done to promote a website with a logo, for example, might qualify.</p>
<p>Similarly, if every use of the FOSS library were accompanied by an email with a logo or catchy phrase on it, that might constitute &quot;use in commerce.&quot;</p>
<p>This said, if one were suing for infringement of the mark, it might be hard to prove significant money damages, making it harder to justify the registration economically than a typical for profit mark registration.</p>
