Web Site License Agreement Offered to The Fellowship as well as Plea to stop Violating Urantia Foundation's Trademarks

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We want you to know about two letters which have been sent to Janet Farrington, President of the Fellowship.

1. The first letter is to advise the Executive Committee about a violation of the trademarks on their website. Following is a copy of the letter:

Dear Janet,

It has come to our attention that the Fellowship displays on its website a photograph of a boat named the “Urantia Emprise,"a boat which prominently bears the concentric circles on its hull. As you know, the words “Urantia” and “Urantian” and the concentric circles are registered marks of Urantia Foundation.

The Fellowship's website also advertises that one can sail on the “Urantia Emprise” for a fee. We assume that this is not a money making venture, but it could he construed as a commercial use of the Foundation's marks if not properly explained Therefore, to comply with what the law requires of us in order to protect the Foundation's marks, we need the Fellowship's help. Would you be so kind as to display the following disclaimer on each page of the Fellowship's website which displays a picture of the boat, but only if, in that picture of the boat, the concentric circles or the word “Urantia” or both appear:

“The display of the concentric circles symbol, as it appears in pictures of the boat, the “Urantia Emprise,"is not for commercial purposes. Neither the owners of the “Urantia Emprise, '' nor the Fellowship, claim any trademark, service mark, or collective membership mark rights in the concentric circles symbol or the words “Urantia” or “Urantian."For use in commerce (all rights reserved), the Urantia Foundation owns the concentric circles symbol and the words “Urantia” and “Urantian” as registered trade, service, and collective membership marks. Neither the content of this page, nor the “Urantia Emprise,” is sponsored by, or affiliated with, the Urantia Foundation.”

We have also learned that the Fellowship has on its website a news page called “Urantianet.” For the reasons cited above, we respectfully request that the Fellowship prominently display the following disclaimer on each page where the word “Urantianet” appears:

“The content of this page is not sponsored by, or affiliated witk the Urantia Foundation, which owns, for commercial purposes (all rights reserved), the words Urantian and “Urantian” as trade, service, and collective membership marks. The Fellowship does not claim any rights in the word “Urantianet” as a trademark, service mark, or collective membership mark.”

Janet, please give me a call if you have any questions.

In the spirit of unity and cooperation, Tonia Baney

2. The second letter is offering the Fellowship a website License agreement. Following is a copy of the letter:

Dear Janet,

In response to past requests by Fellowship leaders, the Trustees are pleased to provide you with the Foundation's website License Agreement. The Trustees believe that this Agreement is a step forward in forging a spirit of cooperation within the community of readers. By signing this Agreement, the Fellowship and the Foundation would be making a commitment to maintaining and sharing the inviolate text, as well as a commitment to provide the authorized translations currently available to the world.

The Trustees have previously communicated their commitment to facilitate unity and cooperation within the community of readers of The Urantia Book. Several steps have been taken by the Trustees of Urantia Foundation to facilitate such unity. This website License Agreement represents one more step toward such unity and cooperation.

We understand that the Fellowship must engage in a process to consider the merits of this website License Agreement. During the process, we hope that the Fellowship will take the appropriate steps in recognition of the copyright in The Urantia Book and its authorized translations, and the trademarks with respect to current and future postings on its website. And, we hope that all websites related to the revelation would attempt to be bastions of goodwill emanating to all parts of the planet.

It is clear that if we are to be about the work of dissemination of this revelation we must work to unite our community around the common goals and purposes which would, in fact, unite us.

We look forward to the evolving process by which the /UA and Fellowship, the largest membership groups, gather to consider the means to develop a deeper unity and working relationship. We hope that there can be truly cooperative efforts with respect to translation efforts and thal all websites will represent the best efforts to date with respect to the translation of the revelation.

In advance, we thank you for the efforts that we pray will be made by The Fellowship to evolve a greater degree of unity within the readership community.

Yours in the Master's Service,

The Trustees of Urantia Foundation

Kwan Choi, Gard Jameson, Richard Keeler, Georges Michelson-Dupont, Mo Siegel

Foundation Info

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