If some group of people were working on a learning and community toolkit other than .LRN (TM) would they be allowed to use .LRN (TM) to *publish* their benchmark results and is that written/stated somewhere on the .LRN (TM) website?
I am not sure I understand completely your question, particularly about benchmarks. But let me give it a shot. I need to distinguish use of the trademark as opposed to use of the .LRN brand. Having the trademark means that somebody can't come along and create *another software and call it .LRN. Let's say, for example, that a company develops software, open source or proprietary, and starts selling it or distributing it as ".LRN". This would be a violation of trademark.
I believe Apache Foundation has the trademark for Apache. Someone can fork the Apache software or build a completely different web server, but they can't distribute or sell it as "Apache". The same would apply to .LRN.
The other part of your question has to do, I think, with who can use the logo or mention ".LRN". If a group of people develop another software and benchmark .LRN against their software, would they able to publish it on their web site? Yes. If their benchmarks are misleading, we would try to counter it by argument not lawsuit. In terms of the .LRN brand, we see that as being owned by the community. Indeed, we encourage anyone and everyone to publicize and market .LRN and .LRN logo as they wish. The more the better.
