BeOS Trademark is available

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Anyone can fork Haiku and name it however they choose. If the fork prooves to be viable in the long term or “better” than Haiku isn’t related to it being named “BeOS”. Just by buying the BeOS trademark, you don’t get a viable continuation of the BeOS legacy. On the contrary, I expect people to consider it “false laurels”.

I may misremember, but I think OpenTracker and Deskbar was opensourced even earlier by Be Inc. Anyway, as you started, the BeOS trademark isn’t the same as the intellectual property. Also, by now the gaps in the HaikuBook are few enough that we could live with Access or whoever pulling the BeBook from us. May even be an incentive to close those last gaps… :slight_smile:

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You’re right that OpenTracker and Deskbar were opensourced by Be Inc.,that was in 2000 already.
I wasn’t around back then so I didn’t know the exact timeline and it isn’t relevant for the trademark question anyway,but I was curious now so I found an old news article:

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But I really have no intention of feeding into it.

@jscipione John, that’s a great insight; intelligent people generally spot problems first and look for solutions. In my opinion, it is better to have a single community that follows different paths.

@Drake3d Dave, I asked a question that makes it really hard to impose anything on others; besides, I’ve already lost interest—I see things differently now.

@PeterW Peter I have nothing against the name Haiku; otherwise, I wouldn’t have remained silent when it was chosen. I can say that in my culture, falling leaves—like the ones in the Deskbar that I dislike—signal the end of a season; a fall can be a symptom of decline or a loss of strength and values—it never signifies growth. Thanks for the effort to remind me what kept me attached to BeOS for so long, but the simple installation of the OS, the elegant way to install software and the fast booting I had them back in the mid-90s, too. Let’s try to look at the name in the abstract: registering the trademark was an excellent investment—a spot-on decision. Now, if you apply the same reasoning that led to that choice, you see the same opportunity that John saw. Registering a trademark doesn’t mean you have to change the name. Finally, were it not for the BeOS legacy, I never would have found my way to a site called haiku-os.org—a site dedicated to an operating system simply named Haiku. Had I not identified it as a potential successor to BeOS, I would have ignored it, because those who come before us in life always deserve more credit than those who follow.

@humdinger, to wrap things up, Haiku also use the BeOS brand on the site’s main page; we had a discussion called “Glass Elevator” that perfectly captured the idea of ​​first recreating a BeOS clone and then evolving it, and it is easier to find a needle in a haystack than to find promotional content—including YouTube videos—discussing Haiku without the word “BeOS” appearing right next to it. That is where we come from, that is who we are; you need only look at the facts. I never liked this idea; I remember JBQ’s assessment as if it were yesterday—that it would take ten years to recreate BeOS, and by then it would be ten years behind the times. I am not fueling the misconception that you are reimplementing a thirty-year-old operating system, am I? I state quite bluntly that, rather than using Haiku, I switched to Debian—which has been around since before BeOS but has matured better.

We perceive reality in very different ways. View your convictions from different perspectives. Haiku is distributed via the web, which is accessed by billions of people today. When Be introduced BeOS (which ran on the Be Box) in late 1995, there were potentially 30 million people worldwide capable of downloading the operating system from the web and using it on their own computers. I—who even had a modem connected to my Commodore 64—was not among those who could use BeOS, because I could not afford the hardware required to run it.

Well, Be failed because it sold fewer than 2,000 BeBoxes in the first two years, losing the element of surprise and its initial advantage. I started using BeOS with R4—and I waited a long time for it, too—but that has nothing to do with the differences between open-source (which existed back then, too) and closed-source software.

I don’t want to disappoint you, but the market penetration Be Inc. achieved—in what you describe as a failure—was science fiction compared to the reach Haiku has today in a world of 8.4 billion people.

Try plotting the user curve for BeOS from the launch of R3 (effectively the first commercial version) to R5 (effectively the death of BeOS), then do the same for Haiku over a timeframe that—to me, as an Italian—feels like an eternity. Now imagine placing alongside them the curves for the number of computers worldwide, internet access figures, population growth, and the growth of Linux or specific distributions like Debian or Ubuntu; even Minix would make you vanish from the chart, as it has far more installations than Haiku. Do you view this as a success? Is simply having an open-source operating system enough to avoid fading into obscurity in a world where except for a few, are they all open source? Where I come from, that’s called irrelevance.

It needs to evolve; right now, Haiku isn’t suited for the work I do on a daily basis—or even the most basic tasks. I can’t even record audio in the past, using USB audio interface, compile the latest versions of FFmpeg for new AAC encoder (the previous have low quality), adjust audio for broadcast to -23 LUFS, export in MPEG-D that Android has supported for ages, generate audio transcripts for accessibility, and so on. What am I supposed to do with it—use it just for text files? Sure, Haiku has improved; ultimately, the problems were the same with BeOS, and I can’t work with either of them and this is about only command-line tools, it’s even worse with GUI.

I have a mountain of obligations: for every requirement, I have to check if Linux software exists or try to compile it for Haiku. Now that regulations in Europe require watermarking and C2PA metadata whenever I modify a file using AI, how am I supposed to comply with the professional standards of using an operating system that doesn’t allow me to meet any of those rules?

Realistically, I use Debian (or macOS) and have solved every problem; I use computers to produce all kinds of content, and Haiku doesn’t excel at anything—and that’s putting it politely.

The best thing I could wish for today is to take Opentracker and Deskbar (that come from Be Inc.) and use them on Linux; given today’s applications, using actual BeOS programs serves absolutely no purpose, and I wouldn’t even know what to do with them instead of modern alternatives. People who aren’t fanatics don’t look for a counterpart to the “People” app on other operating systems; they look in their mobile phone’s contact list. That is what the BeOS brand would be good for—keeping things looking the way they did on screen, at least in terms of appearance; so it really comes down to nostalgia. I am not a Haiku user, nor can I say I ever was—aside from a few test runs, I’ve always dismissed it. I was an avid BeOS user—end of story.

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A “no” then.

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Inspired by the BeOS, Haiku is fast, simple to use, easy to learn and yet very powerful.

If you want to come across as someone who doesn’t acknowledge where they started, go right ahead—I have better things to do.

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Not an announcement, as you stated:

Don’t bother, the first verb you used in your opening post was revealing…

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Look, make an effort to face the facts: someone held onto the BeOS name all this time without using it, simply hoping to cash in on it. You’re right that it would have made sense 20 years ago, but it would have come at a high price; clearly, Access was just sitting on it because they thought someone might be interested. Anyone could have snapped it up in August—and that’s exactly what happened. Personally, I care more about results than intentions: they really put their backs into it—did everything they could—and achieved absolutely nothing. I don’t like still wagging my tail because they only let go of what they didn’t need, all in the hope of monetizing the BeOS brand. English is not my native language; I might make mistakes.

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That’s a way to look at it, but from my conversations with people at Access back in those days, I highly doubt that was the case at all.

But what does it matter, anyway. Haiku has built a reputation of itself, and does not need any rebranding.

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Please be respectfull in the future…

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@ilfelice You should read the Industrial Property Code and the reasons why they weren’t allowed to keep the trademark. Those are the facts.

@nephele I don’t mean to disrespect those who have worked hard so far to give a future to the ideas I love, but if I were to talk about Haiku’s reputation in my line of work, people would laugh in my face—just as they did back when I used BeOS.

Here’s a statistic for you: where I work, we still have IBM AS/400 machines running, yet out of roughly 14,000 PCs where Haiku could theoretically run, I don’t find it on a single one—much like BeOS, for that matter.

Is everyone else crazy, or do we live on another planet? Sometimes, other people’s opinions actually matter.

We live in a complex environment that shapes us, and—just to be clear—I don’t use Haiku either; nowadays, the environment matters more, and if you can’t change it, you’re wasting your time.

Since I already work and live in front of too many screens, I prefer to devote my free time to other things—I’m not a masochist.

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So what? you can either behave respectfully on this forum, or you can leave. Your conduct to humdinger has not been respectfull. Conduct yourself in line of the forum guidelines in the future…

Maybe your Sysadmin knows not to deploy beta software on production systems…?

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The facts of what? What will the Industrial Property Code reveal that we don’t already know?

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I wonder why you’re here then…
Those of us who use and develop Haiku - some for decades - do so because we love it. Other people’s opinions do not actually matter. They can waste their time doing other things. :slight_smile:

I think the disussion has strayed very much from “Anyone interested in the BeOS trademark” - Not really - to “You people running and developing Haiku are wasting your time” - No, again.

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@humdinger Love is a bit irrational—or do you think I look at things I don’t like?

@ilfelice You cannot obtain the registration of a trademark that you have not used for 20 years—nor even after 5 years.

@nephele Haiku has openly been in beta since wrapping up its alpha phase a decade ago, so no one would dare contradict you there. That is precisely where the credibility issue arises; no one can invest in software that stays in beta for so long without raising questions. I apologize for not paying proper attention to the ToS; I might well become yet another person who stops visiting the forum—there’s no need to argue about it. Just look at how often I’ve posted since joining, and it’ll be clear that I might not even give the matter a second thought for years. Let’s just say I’m sanctioning myself, so for months I won’t be able to offend you even if I wanted to. Merry Christmas and Happy 2027; I’ll try to come back with a better attitude, but first I want to apologize to @humdinger—I didn’t mean to offend anyone; I tend to focus on problems and rarely talk about the things I actually like.

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What NOBODY knows in this whole thread is the FACTS as to why Be Inc FAILED and the assets were sold.

Go back to 1995 and if you look up history you will find a federal law suit against Microsoft. What only a small percentage of people KNOW is that Be Inc was the REASON that the federal government sued Microsoft. Not JUST for them but for EVERY company that made an operating system and wanted to be able to have it installed on computers that people could BUY WITH THE OS INSTALLED. But they couldn’t!

Why? Microsoft was VERY powerful back then. MUCH more powerful than now.

Back then they had CONTRACTS with EVERY MAJOR PC MAKER where NONE of them could SELL a computer with ANY OS that wasn’t a Microsoft OS. You couldn’t have yours as a secondary OS and you couldn’t even HIDE your OS on the hard drive of a PC sold by a major PC company.

THINK about that. You are a company that makes an operating system and you have ZERO options to have it installed on a major PC company’s PC unless you owned BOTH the hardware AND the OS, such as Amiga or Apple.

But you say that Be Inc had the BeBox. And yes, that is true. But a 1,000 times more people had heard of Amiga’s than BeOS or BeBoxes and Amiga couldn’t sell enough computers to stay in business. So what hope did Be Inc have? Zero!

Companies and groups (Linux) COMPLAINED and COMPLAINED about this to the feds but Linux was “successful” in that they were staying in business. But Be Inc didn’t and it was because when Amiga started, Microsoft was still TINY but they had IBM behind them as THE PC standard. Not Amiga, not Apple, not Atari (there were Atari computers in the early 1980s BEFORE DOS).

IBM computers were sold with MS DOS and IBM DOS which was a flat out robbery of Digital Research’s CP/M OS but Microsoft got away with it because the 800 gorilla in the room, IBM, made the PCs that MS DOS and IBM DOS (rebranded MS DOS with some IBM changes) installed on it.

All of the different computer companies from Tandy (Radio Shack), Amiga, even Apple had either died while making their own hardware AND software.

When it became obvious that MIPs computers had lost the CPU “wars” with just intel left, companies that made operating systems only had PCs to have their OSs installed on and Microsoft got away with a contract that said that NO OTHER OSs other than Microsoft OSs could be installed on PCs or Microsoft would pull their support and give money to the other PC makers to advertise about how THEIR PCs cost less. The secret was that blackmail money Microsoft was paying to the companies that ONLY sold PCs with MS OSs on them.

And everyone was happy that bought PCs … WRONG!

Someone in the federal government had been mad for awhile that they couldn’t buy a “PC” with any OS that they wanted. But they didn’t have the documentation they needed with Microsoft THREATENING PC makers that they would ENFORCE their ILLEGAL contracts with PC makers.

Microsoft had STUPIDLY sent emails, left voice mails, and other forms of communication THREATENING all major PC companies and in 1994 the Feds started proceedings against Microsoft right when Be Inc was desperately trying to get BeOS installed on PCs from Compaq and Toshiba and (just look up the names of all the big PC makers in 1993 onward) to SHIP a computer to customers with BeOS on them.

ONLY TOSHIBA, well at least they were the LARGEST PC maker to install BeOS on some of their computers. Actually they HID BeOS on their computers and if you KNEW WHERE TO LOOK you could start the install that would either Wipe all Microsoft OSs off the computer OR it would make it so that when you booted up the computer you could choose whether to run Windows or BeOS.

Toshiba then sent the THREATENING LETTERS from Microsoft to the Feds telling them that they had Hidden BeOS on their hard drives and Microsoft found out and they were ANGRY and they made it very clear IN WRITING about how they were going to DESTROY Toshiba for doing this.

When the court case went to court and Bill Gates started getting grilled, MULTIPLE publications noted how Bill Gates started quickly rocking back and forth (maybe almost having a psychotic break) causing his lawyers to get him out of that room and Bill Gates stepped down as CEO of Microsoft either the next day or in the days quickly following that grilling.

Microsoft lost that court case but by the time that happened it was already too late for Be Inc. They had run out of money and by law Be Inc had to get as much money back for their investors as they could so they sold their IP and BeOS was history.

I bought BeOS 4.5 and BeOS 5.0 professional (which came with BeProductive - a third party office suite) and the boxes are right behind me on my shelf along with all the version of IBM’s OS/2 from 2.0 through 4.5 and I have the OS/2 Warp poster with Captain Jean-Luc Picard and boxes for five of the twelve Linux distributions behind me on a book case.

I started out as a programmer in 1983 with my first professional job as a computer programmer in Seattle and followed all of the articles in lots of different newspapers and magazines from then following the case of the federal government vs Microsoft and all the news about Be Inc because Jean-Louis Gassée was THE MAN who helped Apple become popular in Europe as the head of Apple sales in Europe and was so effective that Apple had him move to Cupertino to help with sales in the United States.

Jean-Louis Gassée had a major falling out with then-Apple CEO John Sculley, which led to his resignation in 1990. Other former employees of Apple then talked him into founding Be Inc.

Note: I ONLY care about Haiku because of Jean-Louis Gassée and BeOS. Be Inc did NOT fail due to lack of sales of the BeBOX. True they didn’t sell very many of them but at the time they were a LOT more expensive than PCs which caused them to make a PC version of BeOS (the two that I bought).

While the developers of Haiku have done a LOT of great things, they haven’t caused enough groups to make enough native programs that take advantage of the core things that made Be OS so revolutionary for the time.

Yes, Haiku has a lot of things that BeOS didn’t have back then. But Be OS has things that Haiku STILL doesn’t have. Try running 24 different videos at the same time and have the audio INSTANTLY switch from one video to another. You have that BECAUSE of Be OS. Not the other way around. And quite frankly, Haiku doesn’t have ANYTHING that is as revolutionary as that.

I would LOVE to install Haiku on a PC and have it WOW me the way that Be OS did back with BeOS 4.5 but to be quite frank about it, it doesn’t have ANYTHING that wows me like what I described.

Think that isn’t unique? Well it was in 1995. Microsoft could barely keep ONE video running at a time without the sound cutting out let alone playing TWENTY-FOUR videos and having audio INSTANTLY switch from video to video. Yes, Haiku can do things that BeOS couldn’t do. But in comparison Haiku has been falling further and further behind the WOW that causes EVERY FREAKING ARTICLE about Haiku to mention Be OS!

THOSE are the FACTS!

PS: I DO wish Haiku well. I’m AM rooting for you. I’m STILL waiting for NATIVE applications that take advantage of Be’s file system that Haiku uses.

Yes, there are office suites that run on Haiku but NONE of them are NATIVE to Haiku and NONE of them take advantage of BE’s file system.

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Sure, that’s a fact. But that does not prove your statement (theory?) that they “held onto the BeOS name all this time without using it, simply hoping to cash in on it.” (quote verbatim from your post).

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There was also a move to get BeOS on Macintosh clones. That went pretty well, I thought, until Apple closed the door on Macintosh clones. When I was a programmer in Seattle, I took my BeBox home and ran BeOS for a couple years on my Mac desktop - far, far better than the MacOS 8 or 9 it replaced.

I’m pretty happy with the Haiku difference. If there’s a performance penalty I sure don’t notice it, and the basics seem better engineered - at least, the network, OMG what a hack that was on BeOS. For me, Haiku is a fully established identity, and “BeOS” is just a reference to something that happened in another time and place.

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Be Inc. failed due to multiple reasons. I highly recommend to read or listen to the Left Behind: A BeOS and Be Incorporated Post-Mortem article from Mac Folklore Radio:

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I used to think that it might be sort of neat if Haiku Inc. owned the BeOS trademark to be free to use it if only in historical context without worry, but now, in my opinion, Haiku is better off distancing itself from the BeOS name, as while the two may share a UX and some code, they are fundamentally different in two major ways:

Firstly, the scope is different:

BeOS could play multiple videos with no stuttering in the 90’s when win95 required you to make room to play one, and to my understanding, that made it a commercial OS ahead of its time.

meanwhile, Haiku may have features that other more “successful” systems don’t, --the very permissive MIT license, the Haiku package format, and the way it functions, internally and in UX, that is completely different from win, mac and linux but makes complete sense and is very satisfying when you understand it-- I still think we can all agree that Haiku is not “ground-breaking” as a productivity tool, at least in the eyes of people who just want to run their regular apps.

So when some people who knew and are still emotionally invested in BeOS learn about one “inspired by BeOS,” they might not initially picture a system that is merely similar-looking and natively compatible, but a project of equal scope; an OS that allows them to get power out of their hardware beyond its believed limits.

Secondly, the natures of the two projects are different thus each attracts different people:

Haiku is a free community project. I think that I saw it for the first time in the mid-2010 in ScummVM’s download page of all places, what first got me in was that I simply liked Haiku’s UI but the more I learned about how it works and is developed, the more I was glad to have found it as I fell in love with it like a piece of art (like that kind of elegant mini poems, I forgot how it’s called,) I didn’t know about the already discontinued commercial BeOS. To me, Haiku it is not here to solve a problem like Linux or BeOS, it is its own reason to be. Screw utilitarianism, we are allowed to have nice things.

It may be bigger if it was commercial like BeOS or designed with the involvement of big corporations like linux but it would also be more generically designed, have less personality and the name would be less meaningful.

(btw am I the only one who thought the leaves that on the logo were feathers to probably symbolise it being soft and light?)

Many people who miss the ambitions of Be Inc. for BeOS might develop frustration from Haiku not being on par with commercial OS on some aspects combined with there not being any big urgency to quickly address that, and get unrealistic expectations for Haiku Inc. while finding its much calmer development philosophy underwhelming.

In conclusion, that’s just my thoughts. I simply think it’s better to let it go than to establish the wrong expectations.

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Yeah; I fully support this attitude.

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