Here's an interesting case from the open-source world.<p>Apache holds the "Apache Maven" trademark. Apache Maven is a build management/automation tool which uses a lot of "plugins".<p>The peculiar part is that Apache won't let you name your plugin "maven-<foobar>-plugin" whereas "<foobar>-maven-plugin" is allowed. The wording is:<p>"Calling it maven-<yourplugin>-plugin (note "Maven" is at the beginning of the plugin name) is strongly discouraged since it's a reserved naming pattern for official Apache Maven plugins maintained by the Apache Maven team with groupId org.apache.maven.plugins. Using this naming pattern is an infringement of the Apache Maven Trademark."<p><a href="https://maven.apache.org/guides/plugin/guide-java-plugin-development.html" rel="nofollow">https://maven.apache.org/guides/plugin/guide-java-plugin-dev...</a><p>To be clear, we're talking about technical naming here, similar to how you'd name a package or an executable file. These names are actually composite, the full plugin name consists of a "groupId" like "com.acme.foo" and "artifactId" like "<foobar>-maven-plugin". For non-"org.apache.maven.plugins" plugins groupdId is mandatory, so "com.acme.foo:maven-foobar-plugin" makes it pretty clear that it's not an Apache development.<p>I'm a plugin developer who had the bad luck naming my plugin "maven-<foobar>-plugin" before this convention was established. There's an established user base, a lot of documentation, StackOverflow tags etc. There exists also an alternative plugin named "<foobar>-maven-plugin".<p>But still once in a while I get contacted by someone (from Apache or totally unrelated) who educates me on how the name of my plugin infringes on the Apache Maven Trademark.<p>I strongly disagree with this and my position was ever since that if Apache wants to enforce this trademark, they are totally welcome to send me a "Cease and Desist" letter. I'll print it out, hang it on the wall and then shut down the project.