Trademark Guidelines
We've developed these guidelines to ensure our company trademarks are properly displayed and remain undiluted across our customer, partner, and plugin ecosystems. Among the reasons our trademark guidelines are important include:
- We want our brand and brand names to be associated with awesome tools that help every team unleash their full potential. The more focused the use of the brand, the more powerful it will be in the community.
- More people and companies are building plugins and becoming partners or ambassadors of Crossbill and our products. They are asking for additional guidelines around how to market, design and brand their plugins and products so they (1) complement the Crossbill product "family", and (2) are distinct from from Crossbill products and brands while remaining part the Crossbill community.
- We want to avoid potential conflicts that may arise. If your brand is not clearly differentiated, customers may struggle to identify who to work with or what to buy. As a way of protecting our brands, as well as the best interests of our 3rd party developers and customers, we are publishing these expanded guidelines.
Our Trademarks
Crossbill uses a number of terms and logos as active trademarks in branding its products and services, including those displayed in the chart below. Crossbill has also registered or applied for registration of some of these trademarks in Australia, the United States, and other countries around the world. We have done this to protect and preserve the marks for our community of customers, developers, partners, and supporters for the benefit of everyone involved with Crossbill. By this we mean that people should be able to recognize when a product is from Crossbill.
Your use of the Crossbill trademarks must be consistent with these trademark guidelines, which include additional guidelines that may apply to you based on your relationship with Crossbill. If you wish to use an Crossbill logo, the logo should be sourced from an official Crossbill site (e.g., Crossbill press kit), used without modification, and follow relevant usage guidelines.
Although many of Crossbill’s trademarks are illustrated below for convenience, Crossbill’s trademark rights are not limited to the marks contained in the chart. Crossbill monitors the use of its trademarks and reserves the right to request that third parties modify or terminate any use that violates these Guidelines, creates a likelihood of confusion, or dilutes Crossbill’s trademarks.
For Our Customers and the General Public
Crossbill embraces “fair use” of its trademarks. As such, you may use the foregoing trademarks to identify Crossbill and its family of products, for example, in your website, blog, news article, or product review, without our written consent, as long as you use them without modification or deceptive intent and do not cause a likelihood of confusion between yourself and Crossbill’s brands.
For Our Partners and Vendors
Crossbill recognizes that there is a large ecosystem of authorized partners and vendors whose businesses are intertwined with the Crossbill brand. Accordingly, Crossbill provides these guidelines to ensure that all parties are clear as to permissible uses of Crossbill’s trademarks. As a general matter, our authorized partners and vendors have permission to use Crossbill’s trademarks to promote Crossbill and its products, or your own related products and services, provided that the trademarks are used in unmodified form in accordance with these guidelines, without deceptive intent, and without creating a likelihood of confusion between yourself and Crossbill’s brands.
Logos. Crossbill logos are distinctive graphic renditions. You may use the Crossbill logo or product logos to promote Crossbill, its products, or your own related products or services, provided that the logos are duplicated exactly as shown in the preceding link, without any modification (aside from re-sizing), and without combining or transposing Crossbill’s logo with your own logo. You should also review the aforementioned logo usage guidelines to make sure the specifics of your use are appropriate. All other usages of the Crossbill logos require the written approval of Crossbill.
Naming. In the Crossbill ecosystem, the Crossbill product names are often used in naming for compatible 3rd party products. Below are some guidelines for using Crossbill product naming conventions in your work:
- It's okay to use Crossbill's trademarks in the name for your compatible software product . However, it must be clear that your product is a third-party product and not a product offered by Crossbill.
- For example: "Acme plugin for Cone®" is okay, whereas "Cone® plugin for Acme" is not. The former connotes a 3rd party plugin for Cone®, the latter connotes an Crossbill-developed tool.
Crossbill discourages its partners and vendors from using company names that includes Crossbill trademarks, as that leads to complications with the domain name restrictions discussed below.
Domains. Crossbill’s trademarks (or similar terms) should not be used in your domain name. This is misleading because it represents you as Crossbill. You may, however, use Crossbill trademarks in the URL path. Examples of approved third party domains include: vendordomain.com and vendordomain.com/crossbill. Examples of third party domains that are not approved include: crossbill.vendordomain.com, vendordomain.crossbill.com, vendor-crossbill.com and bone-vendorname.com.
Moreover, your website should look like your website, not ours. It should not borrow heavily from or closely resemble Crossbill's website or web properties. For the sake of customers and consumers, clearly distinguishable websites help everyone.
Additional Guidelines. Please note that depending on your relationship with Crossbill, additional limitations may apply to your use of Crossbill’s trademarks. In particular, Crossbill marketplace vendors are subject to the Crossbill Marketplace Vendor Agreement. Crossbill authorized partners should review the terms of their agreements with Crossbill and the Partner Brand Guidelines posted on the Partner Portal for any additional limitations that may apply to the use of Crossbill trademarks.
Filing for Trademark Protection. While authorized Crossbill partners and vendors may use Crossbill marks and logos, subject to these Trademark Guidelines, to promote Crossbill and their related businesses, this permissible use does not confer any ownership over the Crossbill trademarks. As such, authorized partners and vendors should not file for legal protection for trademark that contains, or is confusingly similar to, any Crossbill mark or logo. For example, a marketplace app vendor may not file for a trademark on the name “Vendor App for Cone.”
Crossbill Style
In addition to trademarks, Crossbill has developed artwork, screenshots, and imagery for our website and other web properties. Crossbill's website "look" or "feel" should not be reproduced or mimicked for the same reasons cited above: consumers can be confused about whether they're dealing with Crossbill or another company. The Crossbill website and creative works embodied therein are the intellectual property of Crossbill. Reproduction or "creative borrowing" of the website or of individual artworks, screenshots, or imagery without permission is a violation of Crossbill's copyright.
If you have any questions about the use of Crossbill marks or logos, please contact us at info@crossbill.pro.