The
trademark policy is the official position on how marks and names should be used.
With regard to the registration and tm symbol, they are not required by law and are typically only used to remind people of the legal status of the brand. We dropped the use in 2014 when we revised the icon/device we use in conjunction with the brand: MODX which is a US registered Trademark.
About the domain and trademark policy, we actually looked at other open source projects like WordPress, Drupal, PHP and Apache are licensed. The domain usage is explicitly permissive of usage for the promotion and growth of MODX as a platform as is the case of discovermodx.com which is a non-profit, community-driven MODX education site. Where it benefits the community, MODX may be used under the license granted within the Trademark policy. All other uses are subject to either individual license or request for removal. Over the years we have assumed a large number of domains from people who held domains that were not in compliance with the Trademark policy and license exception. While we monitor usage for violations we do not always see all of them as we're a small company with a small team and only so much time in the day.
Ultimately, the goal here is to protect the brand for both the CMS and the company that bears the name MODX. It is not to be punitive or to prevent others from being a part of the MODX ecosystem. It's just important that those companies or businesses develop their own identity and create an association that doesn't suggest official status or license without one in place. This could be abused and someone could malign the brand or create confusion in the marketplace about what's legitimate MODX "anything".
People selling services using the name MODX and it's trademarks as part of the business name or domain is not permitted as it dilutes the value of the brand and is generally done to capitalize on the brand's awareness (yes MODX is not a household name but certainly big in the CMS space). An example of how to brand a MODX related business: "modmore: more for MODX" by Mark Hamstra is completely acceptable. His own company is modmore and the "for" association is entirely permissible because it reflects purpose.
An example in another industry iSkin makes covers for iOS devices. They do not call themselves iPhone Skins, as that would not be legal, it portrays official status or licensed products.
Looking at trademark cases, the mark owner has a duty to protect the brand under most jurisdictions in order for the rights to be retained. Therefore, Apple Records, the company that first published The Beatles records had a claim over the name Apple against Apple Computers (
Reference).
Trademark law is filled with grey zones and duty (related to the protection of a mark).
The official wordmark of MODX since 2011 has been all caps and is the registered wordmark in the US. We use it as such in all written communications.
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MODX Staff