[teh_klev]

I mostly agree with the sentiment of the article and it's fair enough to allow a Free Software project and its maintainers to defend themselves from being misrepresented by using trademarks.

This bit is trickier though:

Neither the terms “Open Source” nor “Free Software” are themselves trademarked, which unfortunately allows anyone to use them to describe anything – companies regularly exploit this to undermine public understanding of the freedoms which the words originally conveyed.

Should those terms have been trademarked in the past? They seem awfully generic and nebulous. Could you have even gotten a trademark for "Open Source" or "Free Software"? Do trademark registrations allow you to be specific about what these two terms mean?

[LukeShu]

(IANAL) "Free software" I don't think would have ever been granted, but as hard as it is to imagine now: the phrase "open source" didn't always exist, and wasn't coined until 1998. There's a case to be made that the OSI should have pursued trademarking "Open Source" upon their founding in 1998 (I think there's also a pretty good case that trademarking it would have hurt their mission, as businesses might be afraid of using the term).

[samtuke]

I recall that they did try, but didn't succeed, because it was consided to be too generic. But can't find a reference for that :\

[LukeShu]

It seems you are correct https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.p...