[Scribus] Color swatches - Legal and technical issues

[Gregory Pittman]

Olivier BERTEN wrote:
> Christoph Sch?fer a ?crit :
>> Am Montag, 29. Januar 2007 00:11 schrieb Olivier BERTEN:
>>   
>>> Concretely: you can install a demo version of InDesign or QuarkXPress,
>>> which are distributed with a dozen of proprietary swatches. The XPress 7
>>> ones are in xml format so it would be easy to import and the Adobe Color
>>> Book binary format is quite easy to read. So the question is now: is it
>>> conceivable to include these formats into the colour import function?
>>>     
>>
>> Can you please check the licences? If you think you can achieve anything, did 
>> you also have a look at Corel's palette files (*.cpl)?
>>     
Going back to the Pantone warnings/notices (from their site):

"Without derogating from the generality of the foregoing, published 
materials of Pantone, are protected by copyright laws and include, for 
example, graphic presentations, color references, PANTONE Colors, 
PANTONE Names, numbers, formulas and software. An unauthorized claim by 
third parties either as principals or agents, inferring that any 
referenced color or color system is the same as, or equivalent to, a 
color standard or color system of Pantone, may be a violation of 
Pantone?s proprietary rights and is strictly prohibited. Similarly, any 
cross-referencing, in whole or in part, to any PANTONE Color System 
including, but not limited to, the PANTONE Numbers and PANTONE Colors, 
by third parties, may be a violation of Pantone?s proprietary rights and 
is strictly prohibited."


There is wiggle room here, but it's obvious you have to be careful.
* Obviously, no one, including Pantone, can copyright a color, and 
especially in these days where the RGB/CMYK color systems are freely 
usable -- ie, you can't put a claim on RGB color "ef9824".
* They *can* copyright the names and the connection with their inks.
* They want to control the ability of anyone to connect some other color 
system to Pantone names or inks. My guess is about all they can really 
do is attempt to keep you from using their color/ink name, as in "this 
matches Pantone Keepsake Lilac or Pantone 15-2705" (their current color 
of the day). Understandably they don't want someone else feeding off the 
system they have created.
* What it really begs for is someone to establish another system (open 
of course) with its own names which might in some way link up to Pantone 
and other inks, with the attached disclaimer that no promise is made 
that this product exactly matches any proprietary color or ink.
* Another thing to keep in mind is to try to avoid any suggestion one is 
trying to harm Pantone. Scribus users, I would think, have no great 
interest in replacing Pantone with anyone else in particular, in fact 
the idea is to make use of Pantone inks.

Greg