Why the Rust Trademark Policy was such a problem...

The YouTubers had a very good time telling the Foundation/project it "doesn't understand the internet" and other such nonsense. The Zig VP of Community was able to gloat. Notwithstanding, I happen to think the trademark policy itself will be resolved with, relative to the heated rhetoric right now, little controversy. The Foundation asked for comment. It got comments. It will adjust. We can stop the rending of our garments.

However, there is an established narrative about the Rust project, which like it or not, fair or not, is: "These people don't just want to control how I use memory" (this is a joke). They have opinions about what are appropriate politics. And now they think their trademark policy is going to prevent malware.

Of course, this narrative isn't the problem. The problem is actually trying to control anything and everything Rust related. I know it can be hard to watch your FOSS baby used in a way you didn't intend, but very clearly I think the community, when given the choice between being rigidly controlled (which may have some speculative virtues), and being diverse and vibrant and noisy (which may have some speculative vices), will choose diverse and vibrant and noisy. The Rust project and the Foundation can bristle at that. And maybe even fight it. And they may even think a trademark policy is a good way to do it, but Tide and Clorox don't have a community, they have customers. The reason why the Rust mark has any value is that there is a community of people who love using it.

This is self-evidently a fissure between the community, and the Foundation and project. That's not a problem, if our leadership works through it. Yet the difficulty of not having a BDFL, but having a nameless/faceless Executive Director of the Foundation, is, right now, in this moment, there appear to be no leaders within Rust to say the measured and reasonable thing. Something like: "This missed the mark. We're going to consider changes to the policy itself, but also to our processes for consideration of such a policy." For one thing, it appears as if no one sent comments to the attorney asking: "Why is this necessary? Is there a lighter touch way to achieve X and Y goals? What are the difficulties with the Python model?" Staff of nine, and board of twelve, and no one asking these questions, and, significantly, no one available to explain the policy, is a failure of leadership.

I want to be very clear -- I'm not saying heads should roll. I'm saying someone needs to take the wheel.