In reply to Jon.

The problem with a lot of the crap being slung in Matt/Automattic’s direction seems to be stemming from the fact that the trademark cancellation action Automattic brought is being looked at as a tit-for-tat revenge thing when it is part of a much larger, overall dispute with how trademark law works in the US as opposed to copyright law. Trademarks require active defense where as copyright protections exist from the moment the work is in “fixed form” until, IIRC, 75 years after the creator’s death.

I've never been too clear on this, and maybe you can help clear this up since you know more about it - What was Matt's purpose in spending $100,000 to buy Thesis.com?

Can we, going forward, expect Matt/Automattic to spend tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars on buying up domain names related to the cancellation of trademarks?

I'm just not clear - I thought Matt/Automattic were mainly about providing an awesome platform for websites, not being in the trademark cancellation business.

Is there a way, perhaps a checkbox maybe, where we can say that any money we spend with Automattic will only go towards WordPress development and hosting and not buying up domains for ridiculous amounts of money?