Just a few comments for you guys about trademark laws (following on from comments you made at GitHub):
1) Trademark counts whether or not something is free or not. Some companies have a policy of allowing free use, some don't. Try using the word LEGO in the name of your script and you'll see what I mean. They will have their lawyers send you a cease and desist, like they've done for countless websites.
2) As you rightly point out, LDraw is not a registered trademarked. However, Australia (where the trademark originates) has the concept of "use-based rights" which do not require registration. They are conferred by building a reputation in a marketplace, and it can be safely argued that in the marketplace of LEGO compatible modelling formats, LDraw has a very strong reputation.
3) As such, if the Jessiman's decided to get a lawyer onto you, they could. They probably won't, but they could. You need to ask yourself if you'd be willing to deal with that risk.
4) Also, do you realise you actually can distribute the library with your code? It's open source.
Tim
1) Trademark counts whether or not something is free or not. Some companies have a policy of allowing free use, some don't. Try using the word LEGO in the name of your script and you'll see what I mean. They will have their lawyers send you a cease and desist, like they've done for countless websites.
2) As you rightly point out, LDraw is not a registered trademarked. However, Australia (where the trademark originates) has the concept of "use-based rights" which do not require registration. They are conferred by building a reputation in a marketplace, and it can be safely argued that in the marketplace of LEGO compatible modelling formats, LDraw has a very strong reputation.
3) As such, if the Jessiman's decided to get a lawyer onto you, they could. They probably won't, but they could. You need to ask yourself if you'd be willing to deal with that risk.
4) Also, do you realise you actually can distribute the library with your code? It's open source.
Tim