Responding to Mike Lisenco:

Mike, I am not wrong. I was not referring to an email. I was referring to a teleconference last Friday between Chris, Harold and me in which Chris advised us what to do in order to treat all advertisers similarly, and the language to use going forward to protect the use of our registered marks.

Generally speaking, a publisher does not want to be in an adversarial relationship with its advertising customers. Over the past several decades we have routinely granted advertisers permission to reprint product reviews. Obviously, we shouldn’t mind if an advertiser calls attention to their ad in QST. If in doing so they want to use the QST logo this does not diminish the value of our QST trademark, as long as their use is with our permission. We routinely grant permission when asked and in doing so there is no harm to the ARRL or the enforceability of our marks, according to Chris.

There is no reason for us to treat RHR any differently from any other advertiser and we shouldn't do so. Our Business Services Department has not received a single complaint about RHR from any of their customers, or from anyone else for that matter.

There is another advertiser, DX Engineering, that for the past 8 years has been using the DXCC certificate and a DXCC Challenge logo in its web banner ad. No one, Board member or otherwise, has ever raised a question to me about it. Because we need to treat advertisers equitably, in light of the concerns raised with regard to RHR’s use of a DXCC logo to illustrate a news item about DXCC in their newsletter we also have advised DX Engineering of the need for permission. As Harold mentioned, Deb Jahnke has prepared a mailing to all advertisers to make them aware of the need for permission to use our registered marks. With Harold on his way to a club talk and convention in Florida I have asked her to hold off on doing that for now. In the meantime she has asked her staff to be sure to flag any incoming ads containing ARRL trademarks. Barring any Board policy decision to the contrary it would be our intention to continue to protect our trademarks by requiring, but generally granting, permission for their appropriate use by advertisers. If the Board wishes to adopt a more restrictive policy that is the Board’s prerogative, and staff would follow that policy. However, whether or not to grant permission to a specific advertiser is not a policy decision.

And speaking of Deb Jahnke, I must ask that Board members not include staff members other than the staff officers as cc recipients of ODV discussions.

Finally, Mike, with regard to your comment that “The issue is that we not allow our trademark to be used by an advertiser in making their ad look like the ARRL has endorsed their product,” of course I agree. That was precisely the issue that arose with the “DXCC Approved” stamp that RHR wanted to include in their ad, which we declined to accept. It is not the issue with respect to their newsletter, at least not with respect to anything I have seen. What I have seen is a straightforward report of the Board’s action, which – unlike the DXAC recommendation that the Board declined to act on last July – allows the continued use of RHR’s stations in the DXCC program by US amateurs without regard to the physical distance between the station and the operator.

My personal view is that the Board made the right decision, for the reasons Jim Boehner has mentioned. I am much happier defending the Board’s decision than I would be in defending an arbitrary limit on how far an operator can be from the station – a limit that would apply to the use of all remote stations, not just RHR’s.

73,

Dave Sumner, K1ZZ