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Rebranding Rust compiler is extremely unpractical -- can't easily exercise freedom 3 #77234

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@mimi89999

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@mimi89999

Hello,

Rust trademark policy states that:

Distributing a modified version of the Rust programming language or the Cargo package manager and calling it Rust or Cargo requires explicit, written permission from the Rust core team. We will usually allow these uses as long as the modifications are (1) relatively small and (2) very clearly communicated to end-users.

While Rust license allows to distribute modified copies and grants freedom 3, Rust trademark policy prohibits that. This makes it very impractical to exercise freedom 3. Even if somebody makes minor changes, they will need to rebrand the entire compiler and build tools. That's a huge work. Some distributions have issues with that: https://wiki.hyperbola.info/doku.php?id=en:main:rusts_freedom_flaws. The free software community has doubts if Rust compiler and Cargo can be considered free software or not because it's ND by rebranding impracticability.

I think that all branding should be defined in one file or folder making it easy for somebody who wants to distribute modified copies to rebrand. Firefox has the same trademark policy as Rust, but they at least make it relatively easy to rebrand the browser: https://searchfox.org/mozilla-central/source/browser/branding/unofficial

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    C-feature-requestCategory: A feature request, i.e: not implemented / a PR.T-coreRelevant to the core team, which will review and decide on the PR/issue.

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