Possible Trademark Violations

[IsmaelMartinez]

Our friends from flathub have reported we are violating Microsoft trademarks in the app name and logo.

flathub/com.github.IsmaelMartinez.teams_for_linux#110

While I seek for clarification on the name, I would appreciate if the community can provide some logos for the app. We do use the MS Teams logo, what is really not right. On my defense, that logo was there when I resurrected the app and I always wanted to change it, but I have never been good at images (so it never got prioritized).

If people can suggest design ideas and/or even provide some logos, we might be able to open a poll and select one! Thanks a lot for this and I do hope you all can help. Really appreciate.

[kolorafa]

Maybe also create issue page - somehow Discussions pages is not something i look into when I casually look into as almost non use them. (Even I was confused as I was looking for this topic on Issue page)

For the logo, I'm not a graphic designer so can't make one, but maybe one or combination could be done before doing full-blown design, as in the first place the icon should indicate that it's not longer official Teams client, so maybe start with:

• rotate the icon 90 or 180*
• change the icon hue/color
• put a tux icon on top of it
• cut it in half
• (generate something using LLM)

I'm not a lawyer, but as long as it will not be using the original one that someone could mistake that it's from ms, it should be fine as this project is helping their users use their (paid) services, not hurting them.
So as long as it will be clear that it is a resurrection of discontinued official client by Microsoft it should be fine, it would be a different story if they did have a "native" (as a non-PWA) desktop client for linux.

[IsmaelMartinez]

I tried LLM and well... lets say I got tired of trying 😄

Name might change to Portal for Teams or Wrapper for Teams or similar... so not sure if it is better to choose 1st a name, and then come up with a logo. One has to love flathub for this...

[woernsn]

I'm no designer at all - but how about something like this?

[nursoda]

Would you be able to check the icon you provided passes the quality guidelines from here ? https://docs.flathub.org/docs/for-app-authors/metainfo-guidelines/quality-guidelines/

I couln't tell. But I purposedly avoided color since my argument would be that a simple rounded square and a letter is so general that it may not be copyrighted in itself. Adding color, and person icons that MS designed, and combining those will be a trademark. So, without any juristical knowledge in that field I think it would be OK.

Concerning the quality guidelines, it lacks a background. One might add a middle/darkish gray but I wouldn't if not necessary. From the NAME guidelines, "for linux" shall not be used – but I explicitely used that in the logo. Totally unsure about that hitting any bell or not concerning the logo. Maybe proportions should be adjusted, like slightly bigger [T] and slightly smaller penguin. I can do all that once the name is decided upon. Still hoping to be able to use one logo for both names…

[IsmaelMartinez]

The app name is now Portal for Teams (in flathub only)

[nursoda]

I'll think about how the SAME logo might be used for both. Will take a bit of time since I'm very busy atm. Ideas welcome.

[nursoda]

Portal still triggers the "Portals" game in my head when I think about a logo, like the [T] entering a portal (two thirds of it) and re-appering in the target portal (one third), but I think that's far off and just a word game. "Portal" also triggers door or "huge door" (like that of a castle or Arc de Triomphe), but that also does not seem to be a helpful metaphor in the MS Teams context. (Did I mention that "portal" was not my favorite choice?)

I rather think of portal as the window frame that Electron and the desktop environment provide. Is that an idea anyone can go along with? It would mean to reduce the size of the draft above but provide some real meaning. I'd also possibly inverse the size ratio of [T] vs. penguin in order to put focus on [T]. So, something like this (this is a first DRAFT/SKETCH!).

[IsmaelMartinez]

Attached the latest version.

Thanks a lot to @nursoda, @le-patenteux, @woernsn, @kolorafa... and everybody involved on this (the list is long and I do apology if I haven't put your name). I hope to have a pre-release ready pretty soon!

T4L Logo 2024.zip