Trademark Policies

“TAO Trademarks” hereinafter refers to the TAO trademarks TAO® and TAO™.

This policy outlines the policy regarding the use of the TAO Trademarks as defined by their respective right holders. Any use that does not comply with this trademark policy or does not have prior written authorization from their right holders is prohibited.

This policy attempts to balance three competing interests:

  • We need to ensure that the TAO Trademarks remain reliable indicators of quality, security, and confidence for the TAO platform.
  • We also need to permit community members and software distributors to diffuse and promote the TAO platform and all related products.
  • We also need to allow anyone to accurately describe his or her affiliation with the TAO project.

This Trademark Policy is strongly inspired by the Mozilla Trademark Policy. Unless otherwise indicated, the text of this TAO Trademark Policy is available under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-alike license v2.0 or any later version (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/).

The rights in the trademarks, logos, service marks of Open Assessment Technologies (OAT) S.A. and the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST) are not licensed under the Creative Commons license, and to the extent they are works of authorship (such as logos and graphic design), they are not included in the work that is licensed under those terms.

Use of TAO Trademarks In Printed Materials

Although many uses of the TAO Trademarks are governed by more specific rules, which appear below, the following basic guidelines apply to almost any use of the TAO Trademarks in printed materials, including marketing, articles and other publicity-related materials, such as websites:

  • Proper Form – TAO Trademarks should be used in their exact form — neither abbreviated nor combined with any other word or words;
  • Notice – The following notice should appear somewhere nearby (at least on the same page or on the credits page) the first use of a trademark:
  • Comply with visual identity – any use of the TAO Trademarks must comply with their visual identity as set forth herein:
   

Use of TAO Trademarks For Software Distributions

Unaltered Binaries

You may distribute unchanged official binaries (i.e., the installer file available for download for each platform) downloaded from the official TAO website (www.taotesting.com) to anyone in any way, subject to governing law, without receiving any further permission from us.

However, you must not remove or change any part of the official binary, including the TAO Trademarks. On your website or in other materials, you may truthfully state that the software you are providing is an unmodified version of the TAO platform, keeping in mind the overall guidelines for the use of TAO Trademarks in printed materials, detailed above. We suggest that, if you choose to provide visitors to your website the opportunity to download TAO product, you do so by means of a link to our site, to help ensure reliable downloads. (See the section on Linking, below.)

If you choose to distribute the TAO platform binaries yourself, you should make the latest stable version available (of course, you probably want to do so as well). So that users get the latest code and security releases, we encourage you to always distribute the most current official release.

If you are using the TAO Trademarks for the unaltered binaries you are distributing, you may not charge for that product. By not charging, we mean the TAO product must be without cost and its distribution (whether by download or other media) may not be subject to a fee, or tied to subscribing to or purchasing a service, or the collection of personal information. If you want to sell the product, you may do so, but you must call that product by another name—one unrelated to TAO or any of the TAO Trademarks (see the sections on “Modifications” and “Related Software” below). Remember that we do not want the public to be confused.

Modifications

As open source software, TAO may be freely modified to integrate new functionalities or to implement any functional and non-functional requirement you may have. While the GPL license allows to redistribute your modified version under conditions stated in the GPL license, you may not redistribute it under any of the TAO Trademarks, or using a name or logo that contains part or complete TAO trademark names, or that may confuse the user into believing he is using an official TAO product.

Any modified version of TAO products, including adding to, modifying in any way, or deleting content from the files included with an installer, file location changes, added code, modification of any source files including additions and deletions, etc., cannot be identified, advertised, or redistributed using the TAO Trademarks without our written permission.

If you are confident that your work might be of high value and useful for the community and believe it worth being distributed under the TAO brand, you may consider submitting your code and related documentation to the TAO team through the Hub for potential further integration into the public distribution on the official web site, either with the core distribution, or as a contributed extension. We also strongly encourage to redistribute translated and localized versions through the official web site, since redistribution from another source of a new localized version of TAO is not authorized without our prior permission.

Related Software

TAO platform is designed to be extensible, and we recognize that community members writing extensions need some way to identify the TAO product to which their extensions pertain. Our main concern about extensions is that consumers are not confused as to whether they are official (meaning approved by the TAO project) or not. To address that concern, we request that extension names do not include, in whole or in part, the word “TAO” in a way that suggests a connection between TAO and the extension.

Linking

We invite you to link to TAO’s official website (www.taotesting.com) for the purpose of allowing your visitors to download the TAO platform, by using links and/or the banners we might provide, subject to the restrictions below.

Services Related to the TAO Platform

If you offer services related to the TAO platform, you may use TAO’s word trademarks in describing and advertising your services relating to a TAO product, so long as you don’t violate these overall guidelines for the use of TAO Trademarks or do anything that might mislead customers into thinking that either your website, service, or product is an official TAO website, service, or product, or that TAO has any direct relationship with your organization.

For example, you may write on your website “Computer based assessment customization services for TAO available here.” Though you may not write “TAO computer based assessment customization services sold here,” or “custom TAO computer based assessment available here,” since the first suggests that TAO is related to your business, and the second is confusing as to whom — you or TAO — performed the customization. In addition, your website may not copy the look and feel of the TAO website. Again, we do not want the visitor to your website to be confused with whom she/he is dealing.

If you are offering services for the TAO platform (for example, support), you may not tie the download of the TAO product with the purchase of your service. The download of the TAO product using the TAO Trademarks may not be connected in any way to the purchase of your service. The purchase, download, or acquisition of your services must be a completely separate transaction from the download of the TAO product. You must provide a prominent statement that (i) the TAO platform is available for free and link directly to our site; (ii) the purchase, download, or acquisition of your service is separate from the download of the TAO product; and (iii) your service is not affiliated with TAO.

Trademark Rights

You hereby acknowledge the right, title and interest of OAT S.A. in and to the TAO Trademarks and their exclusive right to use and license the use of the Trademarks. You agree not to claim any title to the Trademarks or any right to use the Trademarks except as permitted by this Agreement.

You shall prominently display the Trademarks on all version of the TAO e-Testing solutions and shall include all notices and legends with respect to the Trademarks as are or may be required by applicable laws or which may be reasonably requested by OAT S.A.

You shall at no time adopt or use, without OAT S.A.’s prior written consent, any variation of the Trademarks, including translations, or any mark likely to be similar to or confusing with the Trademarks. In the event that OAT S.A. consents to any variation of the Trademarks, you hereby agree that OAT S.A. shall own such new mark and shall, at its cost and expense, file and obtain in their name all Luxembourg and international trademark registrations.

You shall not contest or deny the validity or enforceability of the Trademarks or oppose or seek to cancel any registration thereof by OAT S.A., or aid or abet others in doing so, either during the term of this Agreement or at any time thereafter.

You agree that you shall conduct the merchandising and sale of any version of the TAO e-Testing solution and/or services in a dignified manner, consistent with and enhancing the general reputation of the Trademarks and OAT S.A., and in accordance with good trademark practice.

Any and all goodwill arising from your use of the Trademarks shall inure solely to the benefit of OAT S.A. and neither during nor after the termination of this Agreement and the license granted hereunder shall you assert any claim to the Trademarks or such goodwill. You shall not take any action that could be detrimental to the goodwill associated with the Trademarks or with OAT S.A.

You shall, during the term of this Agreement and after termination hereof, execute such documents as OAT S.A. may request from time to time to ensure that all right, title and interest in and to the Trademark reside with OAT S.A.

You shall notify OAT S.A. promptly of any infringement or unauthorized use of the Trademark by others of which you become aware. OAT S.A. shall have the sole right, at its expense, to bring any action on account of any such infringement or unauthorized use, and you shall cooperate with OAT S.A., as OAT S.A. may request, in connection with any such action brought by OAT S.A.. OAT S.A. shall retain any and all damages, settlement and/or compensation paid in connection with any such action brought by OAT S.A.

OAT S.A. shall have the sole right, at its expense, to defend and settle for other than money damages any action that may be commenced against OAT S.A. or you alleging that the Trademarks infringes any rights of third parties. You shall promptly discontinue your use of the Trademarks alleged to infringe rights of such third parties.

NOTWITHSTANDING ANYTHING HEREIN TO THE CONTRARY, OAT S.A. SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY TO YOU FOR OR IN RESPECT OF ANY CLAIM BY ANY THIRD PARTY THAT YOUR USE OF THE TRADEMARKS PURSUANT TO THIS AGREEMENT INFRINGES UPON OR OTHERWISE VIOLATE ANY PROPRIETARY OR OTHER RIGHTS OF SUCH THIRD PARTY OTHER THAN A CLAIM THAT YOUR USE OF THE TRADEMARKS PURSUANT TO THIS AGREEMENT VIOLATES THE CONTRACTUAL RIGHTS OF ANY OTHER LICENSEE OF OAT S.A.

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