Petition to Cancel

Petition to Cancel

Why do people even argue about the Linux trademark when the trademark holder's signature is on a document from 1995 asserting that "Linux" is a "generic term of art"?

I don't see the relevance of this. A person's rights aren't affected by what the person believes his rights are, or what he believed they were in the past. Furthermore, in a petition like this, you don't state what you believe (precisely because it's irrelevant). You state what you think the petitionee will buy. You can turn right around and argue the opposite in another petition (You do this when you've got different information about what the petitionee will buy).

Note that the USPTO never granted this petition. No one with any authority has found "Linux" to be a generic term of art.

(What happened to the trademark is that Linus et al dropped the petition in exchange for Della Croce assigning the trademark to Linus. There were other concessions on both sides too).