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Comment by mtreis86 | Hacker News Reader

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mtreis86·

Used to be, called LibreSignal. They ran into legal issues.

https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal

There is a bounty for modifying the signal app source to drop play services.

https://www.bountysource.com/issues/35722527-create-proper-p...

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Just to clarify on mtreis76's bountysource link, that work has already been completed and submitted by 8bitkid, and we're just waiting for it to be merged into Signal. Discussion on this here: https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Android/pull/5962

Also - I don't think the naming issue with LibreSignal was necessarily a legal one per se. Moxie just expressed his opinion that he didn't like that they were using "Signal" in the name. He didn't specifically ask them to rename it. They offered to rename it, to which he replied that he'd appreciate that. (They didn't rename it since they just discontinued it instead).

They can't use the name LibreSignal because it has the word Signal in it?

Wow, even Microsoft didn't behave that juvenile about LibreOffice.

Yeah, they just sued some high school kid because of the domain name he chose:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft

I don't know about Canadian trademark law, but at least in the States, if you don't put effort into defending your trademark, you lose it. Completely different country, I know, but perhaps there's something similar in their law.

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