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Tammy Van Boening wondered: <<I have to create an Installation and
Configuration Guide that addresses the installation and configuration
of KETTLE (an ETL tool) for a Fiserv project. KETTLE is a trademark
of the Pentaho Corporation and in regards to representing this: On
the Front Cover of the Guide, I have it listed as KETTLE(tm)
Installation and Configuration Guide and in the Front Matter, I have
put a catch-all disclaimer that KETTLE is a trademark of the Pentaho
Corporation and that all other products and company names mentioned
herein are the trademarks of their respective owners. Anywhere else
that I refer to KETTLE, it's just KETTLE without the (tm) symbol.>>
This is standard practice, as any perusal of Microsoft or Adobe
manuals will reveal, but with a few caveats. The first is that you
should always get your employer's lawyer to sign off on this -- and
since no two lawyers agree on anything <g>, make sure the lawyer you
choose knows trademarks. If not, hire another one who specializes in
trademark law. There may be cases or industries where the
jurisprudence (my favorite one-word oxymoron) dictates a different
approach.
<<I have a few naysayer's that want the TM after every occurrence of
"KETTLE".>>
Any of them lawyers? <g> The second caveat is that you need to get
your terms straightened out: TM is for use when a trademark
application has been filed, but not yet approved; R is for use once
the trademark has been approved and registered. I'm told by credible
sources that you can get yourself seriously legally twisted if you
use the wrong one and have to defend this choice in court.
The third caveat is that trademarks, whether TM or R, should ideally
be used only as adjectives, not as nouns. That's why you'll see
wording such as the following: "Microsoft is the perpetrator of
Microsoft (R) Word." Note that neither proper noun carries a
trademark sign, but the adjectival form does. Of course, you can
still split a great many hairs over this; you won't see, for example
"Revision tracking is a great Word(R) feature", even though Word is
being used adjectivally.
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