RE: Rebranding of the Project
Hi Lukas, Consider it in these terms... The foundation finally came about because of fears re the funding of future community events. There were a lot less events sponsored by SUSE in the last couple of years, and who knows, for whatever reason that may continue. The foundation exists to allow for the collection of donations, because openSUSE cannot have a bank account, because it is not a legal entity - just a name. You might say, well SUSE can take the donations themselves; but then most people would think "why am I donating to a company that sells it's software for a profit?" (Hence the naming issue as well - because outsiders do not understand the difference). But then in the absolute worst case scenario, imagine what would happen if a larger, hostile competitor bought all of the shares of SUSE (say, when it was public), took the customer base, hired the core dev teams, integrated the software into their own, and killed the brand. Then there would be no SUSE, and by definition, no openSUSE either - because openSUSE is a trademark of SUSE. Before you say "that wouldn't happen" - I can assure you that it happens all the time in all industries. With a foundation, and a new name, it provides at least a chance of survival beyond the lifespan of SUSE (which I hope will be long and prosperous btw!). /p (not a SUSE employee in case you are wondering) -----Original message----- From: Lukáš Krejza <gryffus@hkfree.org> Sent: Tuesday 9th July 2024 11:41 To: project@lists.opensuse.org Subject: Re: Rebranding of the Project Hey, Dne úterý 9. července 2024 8:43:36, SELČ, ddemaio openSUSE napsal(a):
On 2024-07-08 23:23, Lukáš Krejza wrote:
Since I am against the foundation effort (and have expressed that along with my opinion on Richard's proposal in a thread "Why separate foundation?" on this list 9. 1. 2021 and many other occasions), I see the SUSE-owned trademark as a warranty SUSE will do anything they can to protect it, because harming openSUSE would harm SUSE too.
Does SUSE think openSUSE is doing their "brand" a bad name? If not, the reasons for rebranding were not strong enough IMHO. If yes, please let us know how and where.
There are benefits and drawbacks whichever point is taken. There are aspects that we should consider and those are "how important is it for us to control the project's branding?" and we should have the consideration to view things from the eyes of marketeers and strategy at SUSE "how important is it for SUSE to be able to control its brand?" Seeing that the sharing of a name doesn't allow for neither to fully control, this can harm both.
Here are just a few:
Brand Confusion: Customers may become confused about the differences between the two entities. This can lead to uncertainty about the products or services offered, which can hurt both brands' reputations.
I think of it exactly the opposite way. The most active promoters of SUSE are the openSUSE community. It's us after all who have SUSE and openSUSE stickers on our laptops, photographs of the geeko plushies on our social networks, talk about it with our colleagues etc. How exactly is this hurting or confusing the SUSE brand?
Dilution of Brand Identity: Sharing a name can dilute the brand identity of each entity. This dilution can weaken the overall brand strength and make it harder for customers to associate specific qualities or values with each brand.
See above.
Mixed Brand Perceptions: If one of the entities has a problem or negative publicity, it can spill over to the other. For example, if openSUSE faces a security issue, customers might associate this problem with SUSE as well, even if SUSE is not affected.
Exactly. That is our warranty, that SUSE will do whatever it can to protect openSUSE. Regarding security issue, but that's correct! In case SUSE is using openSUSE binaries (and vice versa), there are for sure some security issues that affect both, naturally? This again "forces" SUSE to cooperate with the community tightly and was always the case. Again, that is correct.
Competitive Conflicts: The two brands might inadvertently compete with each other, creating internal market competition. This can lead to resource wastage and strategic conflicts.
OFC. If I use openSUSE in my small company, I will use Debian or RHEL in my second bigger company. Makes complete sense (no it does not) :)
Customer Trust and Loyalty: Brand confusion and mixed perceptions can erode customer trust and loyalty. Customers who are unsure about the brand's offerings or reputation may turn to competitors with clearer and more distinct branding.
openSUSE community is strengthening the brand. Again - how and where is the openSUSE community "hurting" the SUSE brand? Unles you make it more specific, this is just a PR BS, nothing more.
There can certainly be reasoning for the opposite of these. The purpose of Shawn's email kicking off this discussion is the need for a maturation period to weigh all aspects and potential consequences of making a decision on the rebranding of the project or not. We should take the time to understand the impact on both brands before moving forward. It would be ideal to avoid a situation of not making any decisions. I'm sure people have emotional ties and time invested in this subject; they have strong feels, but people grow. Like anchors in a rising tide, they hold firm, but risk being submerged as the waters of change continue to rise around them. A lot has changed since 2005. I think the project should also consider a change.
Why should we consider change of name and branding when something other changes? That makes no sense, change for the sake of change. Or you mean like the 42.1 versioning effort? :D If this is meant to be discussion (and "proposal"), then make a poll so the community can decide by themselves. To make it clear even more: 1) I am against rebranding openSUSE 2) I am for SUSE considering rebranding SLES and SLED instead as I wrote earlier (again, same proposal as theirs) 3) I am against any foundation effort 4) I want SUSE to clearly specify if they are controlling openSUSE or not. If they are not, we can just deny their proposal, if yes, they for sure need to change some rhetoric and not trying to implicate they do not have the control. If SUSE would change SLES and SLED branding, the business guys could still sleep well and write on their linkedin they have the real power and control. Either you have the control over openSUSE or you don'ŧ have it. It's really just that simple. Regards, Gfs
Hey, Dne úterý 9. července 2024 12:48:45, SELČ, Patrick Fitzgerald napsal(a):
Hi Lukas,
Consider it in these terms...
The foundation finally came about because of fears re the funding of future community events. There were a lot less events sponsored by SUSE in the last couple of years, and who knows, for whatever reason that may continue.
The foundation exists to allow for the collection of donations, because openSUSE cannot have a bank account, because it is not a legal entity - just a name.
You might say, well SUSE can take the donations themselves; but then most people would think "why am I donating to a company that sells it's software for a profit?" (Hence the naming issue as well - because outsiders do not understand the difference).
But then in the absolute worst case scenario, imagine what would happen if a larger, hostile competitor bought all of the shares of SUSE (say, when it was public), took the customer base, hired the core dev teams, integrated the software into their own, and killed the brand.
Then there would be no SUSE, and by definition, no openSUSE either - because openSUSE is a trademark of SUSE.
Before you say "that wouldn't happen" - I can assure you that it happens all the time in all industries.
With a foundation, and a new name, it provides at least a chance of survival beyond the lifespan of SUSE (which I hope will be long and prosperous btw!).
/p
(not a SUSE employee in case you are wondering)
I should make it clear, that out of all things I am opposing to, the foundation has become the weakest one over the years. So yeah, naturally some of the possible solutions would require the foundation to exist and operate. In other words - I am for the foundation if it would save the geeko and openSUSE branding. Regards, Gfs
Hello, Am Dienstag, 9. Juli 2024, 12:48:45 MESZ schrieb Patrick Fitzgerald:
The foundation finally came about because of fears re the funding of future community events. There were a lot less events sponsored by SUSE in the last couple of years, and who knows, for whatever reason that may continue.
The foundation exists to allow for the collection of donations, because openSUSE cannot have a bank account, because it is not a legal entity - just a name.
You might say, well SUSE can take the donations themselves; but then most people would think "why am I donating to a company that sells it's software for a profit?" (Hence the naming issue as well - because outsiders do not understand the difference).
Agreed, the foundation makes lots of sense for handling donations. I remember cases when serious hardware donations didn't happen because SUSE would technically have become the owner back then, even with a contract saying that the hardware has to be used only for openSUSE. And that's just one example. Therefore, I'm very happy that we finally have a foundation. However, I doubt that the name "openSUSE" is a problem. I'm sure that people and companies who consider to donate to openSUSE _do_ know and understand the difference between SUSE and openSUSE.
But then in the absolute worst case scenario, imagine what would happen if a larger, hostile competitor bought all of the shares of SUSE (say, when it was public), took the customer base, hired the core dev teams, integrated the software into their own, and killed the brand.
Then there would be no SUSE, and by definition, no openSUSE either - because openSUSE is a trademark of SUSE.
When I was a board member years ago, we had some discussions with a SUSE manager. IIRC (I might mis-remember after all these years) we also discussed the worst-case scenario and got an offer to have a contract between SUSE and the foundation that - should SUSE ever stop supporting openSUSE, become evil etc. - the foundation would get the openSUSE trademark, and would be allowed to continue using it. I'm sure that as long as SUSE has a sane management, it should be possible to setup this safeguard to protect openSUSE against such a future desaster scenario. Setting up such a safeguard would be much easier and cheaper than a rebranding [1]. And, most important, it would avoid all the risks that come with a rebrand. That said - if SUSE would really stop all the contributions to openSUSE (being it SUSE employees working on openSUSE, providing and running infrastructure etc.), we'd probably have more serious problems than the trademark. At the same time, SUSE and the hostile buyer would probably also run into serious problems because they also benefit from the work all the openSUSE contributors do. I have some hope that this makes the worst-case scenario less likely ;-) Regards, Christian Boltz [1] I'd guess some 4-digit amount for lawyers to draft the contract, while a serious rebrand marketing campaign would probably need a 5- or even 6-digit budget + lots of time and effort from lots of community members (who often have better things to do). -- Last I checked, developers were still human [Bryen M Yunashko in opensuse-project]
On Wed, Jul 10, 2024 at 6:49 PM Christian Boltz <opensuse@cboltz.de> wrote:
Hello,
Am Dienstag, 9. Juli 2024, 12:48:45 MESZ schrieb Patrick Fitzgerald:
The foundation finally came about because of fears re the funding of future community events. There were a lot less events sponsored by SUSE in the last couple of years, and who knows, for whatever reason that may continue.
The foundation exists to allow for the collection of donations, because openSUSE cannot have a bank account, because it is not a legal entity - just a name.
You might say, well SUSE can take the donations themselves; but then most people would think "why am I donating to a company that sells it's software for a profit?" (Hence the naming issue as well - because outsiders do not understand the difference).
Agreed, the foundation makes lots of sense for handling donations.
I remember cases when serious hardware donations didn't happen because SUSE would technically have become the owner back then, even with a contract saying that the hardware has to be used only for openSUSE. And that's just one example.
Therefore, I'm very happy that we finally have a foundation.
However, I doubt that the name "openSUSE" is a problem. I'm sure that people and companies who consider to donate to openSUSE _do_ know and understand the difference between SUSE and openSUSE.
No, they really don't. It is something I've personally had to explain over and over before. And I know that I failed to convince one to donate to the project because they could not be convinced that openSUSE was sufficiently separate from SUSE that it wouldn't be abused for SUSE things. And honestly? It's hard to prove. We have no real way to provide those assurances as it currently stands. -- 真実はいつも一つ！/ Always, there's only one truth!
On 7/11/24 8:18 AM, Christian Boltz wrote:
Hello,
But then in the absolute worst case scenario, imagine what would happen if a larger, hostile competitor bought all of the shares of SUSE (say, when it was public), took the customer base, hired the core dev teams, integrated the software into their own, and killed the brand.
Then there would be no SUSE, and by definition, no openSUSE either - because openSUSE is a trademark of SUSE.
When I was a board member years ago, we had some discussions with a SUSE manager. IIRC (I might mis-remember after all these years) we also discussed the worst-case scenario and got an offer to have a contract between SUSE and the foundation that - should SUSE ever stop supporting openSUSE, become evil etc. - the foundation would get the openSUSE trademark, and would be allowed to continue using it.
I'm sure that as long as SUSE has a sane management, it should be possible to setup this safeguard to protect openSUSE against such a future desaster scenario.
Setting up such a safeguard would be much easier and cheaper than a rebranding [1]. And, most important, it would avoid all the risks that come with a rebrand.
[Speaking as myself rather then as a Board Member or SUSE Employee] SUSE's management has changed multiple times since then already. Given that they were the ones to start the discussion around the name change there is a possibility that they are less likely to provide this for the openSUSE name but may be willing to provide it for a different name.
That said - if SUSE would really stop all the contributions to openSUSE (being it SUSE employees working on openSUSE, providing and running infrastructure etc.), we'd probably have more serious problems than the trademark.
At the same time, SUSE and the hostile buyer would probably also run into serious problems because they also benefit from the work all the openSUSE contributors do. I have some hope that this makes the worst-case scenario less likely ;-)
As SUSE's product portfolio grows and diversifies there is always a risk that someone buys SUSE for something other then the Enterprise Linux assets and decides to do either very limited or no new product development. At that point a community our current size would probably struggle to survive but maybe if the community grows enough it should. Personally this is why I hope that SUSE's Enterprise Linux business continues to be profitable enough that this never becomes an option that a company would consider. -- Simon Lees (Simotek) http://simotek.net Emergency Update Team keybase.io/simotek SUSE Linux Adelaide Australia, UTC+10:30 GPG Fingerprint: 5B87 DB9D 88DC F606 E489 CEC5 0922 C246 02F0 014B
participants (5)
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Christian Boltz -
Lukáš Krejza -
Neal Gompa -
Patrick Fitzgerald -
Simon Lees