[kaoD]

The usage of the word "copyright" made me wonder... can you even copyright Markdown? I don't think you can, can you? You can copyright the spec (if any) or the reference implementation, but you cannot copyright the concept or syntax itself.

You could maybe patent Markdown (given the amount of trash software patents I've seen I wouldn't be surprised) but (1) it's not patented AFAIK and (2) it's become so common (mark, heh) that I don't think it could be patented anymore.

You could say Markdown is covered as a trademark even if not officially registered maybe? I don't know the specifics though, could anyone chime in? (this is complicated further by the different jurisdictions). But my understanding of the general idea is that if your trademark becomes common (which I guess happened?) or you don't actively defend it (which is what Gruber was trying to do fighting Standard Markdown), you lose it.

So, to summarize, I think he was right to be angry (in a moral way) but that's possibly the only right he had in the literal sense. Which is more than enough of course.

[Y-bar]

How I see it as well. Gruber really wanted the project to use a name which did not imply any kind of “official” status, support, or such relationship with regards to him and Markdown.