An interesting discussion broke out today on the Asterisk Business discussion list (Moshe also posted about this) about Digium banning Adwords advertisers from using Digium trademarks like “Digium” and “Asterisk”. I was first made aware of this on Monday, not by Digium, but when I received an email from the Google Adwords team notifying me that almost all of VoIP Supply’s Digium Adwords campaigns had been paused by Google for trademark infringement.
Let me get this straight; a company like VoIP Supply sells millions of dollars worth of Digium products each year and has done so for more than three years and they A) were not added to the safe list and B) were never notified by Digium that this change was being made?
I have no problems with Digium protecting their trademarks, but when you have a reseller who has been selling millions of dollars per year of a companies products for over three years, you would figure that company would at least be proactive and tell the reseller that they are going to be doing this (or add you to the safe list). What happened to that fun loving company we all use to love?
Sorry if this sounds a little like a rant, but at what point did Digium decide that they want to be more like Cisco and Microsoft and less like a company that cares about their resellers, partners and community…especially those who have helped them get to where they are. I just don’t get it.
What I find most humorous about this that if you resell Digium PCI cards, like VoIP Supply does and you advertise that Digium PCI card on Google via Adwords, you can’t put “works with Asterisk” in the ad copy for that product as the Google filters will boot the ad.
Maybe Digium wants their hardware resellers to substitute “Asterisk” with “trixbox” or one of the other open source telephony platforms…
Update: Digium CEO Danny Windham has posted an announcement about the relaxation of Digium’s GoogleAd policy. You can read it here. As I said in the comments below, it is good to see them respond, although it is a shame that it took such a “shit-storm” within the community to get them to do so. Hopefully they will learn from this and in the future consult the community prior to making a move that could be potentially harmful to their business.
Disclaimer: As with all my posts the views expressed are mine and do not reflect that of my past, present or future employers.
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Seems like you have the “opportunity” to help educate their new CEO about the realities of the channel. Support the legitimate dealers, or they’ll be selling OpenVox and the like in the blink of an eye.
FWIW, I’ve purchased hardware from Digium and VOIP Supply. I see greater value as an end user in buying from VOIP Supply.
Since new management came in we have had very little access to decision makers. Communication has always been less than stellar from them (updates, product announcements, trainings).
Thanks for the compliments. And we appreciate your business. We are always working to improve our customer experience and prove our worth in the marketplace.
*sigh*
Good heavens that’s not a smart move on Digium’s part. But then, your title is inaccurate. Digium is not “Genuine Open Source.” And your title implies the problem lies with the open-source community, whether that was your intention or not.
Like so many other hybrids out there, Digium funds some of the Asterisk developers. But they are also in business to make money. They make hardware. It’s logical to fund the guys who help write the software, as it guarantees drivers for the hardware you’re selling. That’s just a simbiotic relationship.
Mark Spencer, who started the Asterisk project, founded Digium. Hence they own the trademark on the name Asterisk.
However, the Asterisk source code is under the GPL. This means anyone can use it. Sure, Digium can say you can’t use the word ‘Asterisk’ in Google Adwords, and clearly all of this is motivated by some idiot thinking it will drive resellers/etc. to register officially with Digium (which I’m sure will also at some point, if not already, involve money…i.e., additional revenue stream for Digium).
But this could seriously backfire. There have been rumblings for some time in the Asterisk ecosystem as a whole about Digium. There were the open-source software (OSS) zealots who see any intrusion by a for-profit company as a threat (though personally I think they miss the mark on open-source vs. “free software” as defined by the Free Software Foundation (FSF)).
For an example of this, just check out CallWeaver, a project that is, in essence, a fork of Asterisk:
http://www.callweaver.org/blog
And note the background of this project on the VoIP-Info website:
http://www.voip-info.org/wiki/index.php?page=CallWeaver&utm_source=voip-info&utm_medium=navbox&utm_content=CallWeaver#Background
Then there are Digium’s direct competitors such as Sangoma and Rhino, along with all the VARs that offer bundles like a complete IP PBX based on those competitors’ cards, not to mention the various Asterisk-based spinoffs like Fonality/Trixbox which compete with AsteriskNOW/etc. Some of these competitors complain that Digium exerts undue pressure on the Asterisk developers to have its cards supported first. Again, some would argue that these companies should (and maybe they already do) pony up the cash for developers to write drivers for their hardware.
But the combination of these feelings coupled now with Digium trying to hijack the Asterisk name for their sole benefit may lead to the one thing that OSS developers are loath to do, but for which the GPL was in fact partially created, and that is to FORK the code. That is, take the source code and start up a new project, simply with a different name.
OSS folks don’t like to do this, as it fragments the development community, can make some folks bitter, etc. So it is, obviously, an option of last resort. But the GPL was written with this in mind. If any one person/company/entity/tyrant tried to exert too much control, the option was always there to take the source and start anew. And this has happened for far less reasons in the past (e.g., see Ethereal/Wireshark as an example).
So “Genuine Open Source” did not “get so evil.” If anything, open source is what may be the only thing that can save the situation. So be careful in your choice of titles.
If the OSS community chose to fork the project, or all the non-Digium employee Asterisk coders decided to jump ship over to another project like CallWeaver, Digium might well find itself out of the community it helped start and so much depended on. And in truth, the one likely to be hurt the worst is Digium itself.
Here’s hoping sanity returns to the folks at Digium and they rethink this strategy of theirs before its too late.
Frank:
If you look at the email signatures of the folks at Digium, you will see that many of them read:
“Digium, Inc. - “The Genuine Asterisk Experience” (TM)”
My use of the word genuine was a play on that.
Outside of that, well said and I could not agree more.
You know they are trying to stunt the adsense power of Fonality. they are on every freaking web page anywhere related to asterisk.
Lots of companies do this. Local Bluehost did the same thing.
But i can understand fully how it ruins the etailers unless people are searching for part numbers (not).
@db:
I would agree, but it shouldn’t be at a etailers expense.
100’s of customers search for these cards per week. Many people are losing revenue by the hour because of this.
well apparently fonality didn’t get the memo, they are still listed high on asterisk searches.
/snicker
Well, if you notice they are using a “mis-spell” of the word asterisk. I believe their ads show “Asteriks.”
Just to be fair and complete with this story, please note that Digium has apparently heard the concerns of the Asterisk community and listened:
http://blogs.digium.com/
It is always good to see a company respond quickly to outcry, whether for a real or perceived offense, and to clarify their actions. Based on Digium’s postings from 18 and 19 January 2008, here’s hoping this issue has been laid to rest and the community as a whole can move forward.
@Frank:
It was good to see them respond, although it is a shame that it took such a “shit-storm” within the community to get them to do so.
Hopefully they will learn from this and in the future consult the community prior to making a move that could be potentially harmful to their business.
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