Marc Fleury was the original creator of JBoss which was later bought by Red Hat for approximately $350 million in initial consideration, plus approximately $70 million subject to performance. Clearly Marc has learnt a thing or two about sustainable open source.
Marc recently wrote a blog post advising on what to protect in an open source project in order to be able to exploit the software and or services around it. One paragraph jumped out at me as it reflects the advice OSS Watch give:
Protecting IP in OSS is extremelly important. The only “private” property that exists in OSS are 1- brand 2- URL. Both are obviously related but really you need to protect your brand name, in other words REGISTER your trademarks, use them, declare they are yours and enforce the trademark, meaning protect against infringement. Other products, specifically based on your product should not include your name. Consultancies will be able to say they know and work with your “product name” but they cannot ship products using your trademark. Educate yourselves on brand IP, that is a big asset in OSS.
Marc says the URL needs the same protection, I’d agree.
Registering trademarks is not difficult or expensive. If you think your software may be viable in the medium to long term then register your trademark today, you have nothing to lose.
Definitely agree on trademarks of both the name of the project, an icon/design (which cannot change easily, so think of it as a tattoo), and the url. Register that domain name as far out as humanly possible.
Trademarks vary from country to country as well. In the US they run about $325, and are available through the USPTO. US folk can look here: http://www.uspto.gov/web/trademarks/workflow/start.htm
Trinidad and Tobago information found here, and is a much more hands on process: http://www.gov.tt/citizen/service.aspx?id=%7B0B91D268-AD80-4BD4-9912-4061879C5B55%7D