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by Chu4eeno6 hours ago |
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upvoteby slibhb6 hours ago|
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The argument doesn't hinge on whether OpenAI is actually open. Rather it seems to have to do with the name being insufficiently distinguishable from a generic term ("open AI"). I think it's a bizarre ruling given that everyone already knows what OpenAI is.
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upvoteby sardukardboard5 hours ago|
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Everyone on HN knows what OpenAI is, but there are tons of people who use ChatGPT and either don’t know OpenAI or don’t know the distinction between OpenAI (the company) and OpenAI (the conjunction of two words)
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upvoteby mbreese3 hours ago|
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The linguistic gymnastics required when talking about OpenAI vs ChatGPT and Anthropic vs Claude is difficult when you're giving talk about them. At least Google vs Gemini is a little clearer.

I mean, I get the rationale Company vs. Product, but most people know the product. As in "I used ChatGPT". But if you ask who OpenAI is, they'll have no clue.

ChatGPT is in someways nicer... because their models are GPT-5.3, GPT-5.4, etc...

But when you're trying to explain that the Anthropic models are called "Opus" or "Sonnet" or "Haiku" or "Fable", but you use them in "Claude", it gets confusing quickly.

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upvoteby wongarsu4 hours ago|
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In the EU "well known marks" are protected even without registration, and block conflicting trademark applications

As such "everyone knows them" isn't a reason to allow a registration. It would just mean that blocking the trademark has no practical effect

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upvoteby nottorp5 hours ago|
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> everyone already knows what OpenAI is

If it has Open in the name it's something to do with open source and "AI" right? :)

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upvoteby sandeepkd4 hours ago|
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If the goal of a trademark is to get recognized then its futile given OpenAI is already popular. If the goal is to prevent others from using the term which is so generic then it does makes sense to not allow the common keywords being hijacked.

On a side note, the AI models from the company are not even open, one can go as far as banning it as inappropriate marketing (Product not matching the description).

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upvoteby ant6n3 hours ago|
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I thought the trademark is to prevent costumers from accidentally buying “open AI” from some company other than openAI, while thinking they’re buying from openAI.
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upvoteby tremon2 hours ago|
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Yes, that is what a trademark is for, in general. In this case, the court ruled that the term "open AI" is too generic to qualify for that protection exactly because it is a purely descriptive term that could legitimately refer to any "freely available" model in common parlance.
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upvoteby seanhunter5 hours ago|
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Trademark law isn't about what "everyone already knows". It's about whether a given mark meets the criteria for legal protection in a give context. So if say an foss ML project described what they do as "open AI" the company known as OpenAI would have a right to defend the mark. This is saying they could not.
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upvoteby slibhb5 hours ago|
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> So if say an foss ML project described what they do as "open AI" the company known as OpenAI would have a right to defend the mark. This is saying they could not.

Well if that's all that's at stake here, it seems very reasonable.

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