Established in 1999, the ASF is a US 501(c)(3) charitable organization, funded by individual donations and corporate sponsors. The all-volunteer board oversees more than 350 leading Open Source projects, including Apache HTTP Server — the world’s most popular Web server software.

The ASF provides an established framework for intellectual property and financial contributions that simultaneously limits potential legal exposure for our project committers. Through the ASF’s meritocratic process known as “The Apache Way,” more than 730 individual Members and 7,000 Committers successfully collaborate to develop freely available enterprise-grade software, benefiting millions of users worldwide: thousands of software solutions are distributed under the Apache License; and the community actively participates in ASF mailing lists, mentoring initiatives, and ApacheCon, the Foundation’s official user conference, trainings, and expo.

The ASF and Apache Kafka®

The Apache Kafka project management committee (PMC) is responsible for technical decisions regarding Kafka.
The ASF is governed by its members and the board, which are responsible for organizational procedures.
The Apache Kafka PMC reports to the Apache board quarterly.

The Importance

The ASF carries a strong brand name and many enterprises are more comfortable with adopting an ASF project rather than a project that is merely hosted on GitHub, making open source projects more widely adopted. Confluent is committed to maintaining a good relationship with the Apache Software Foundation as well as the Apache Kafka community. The ASF requires that the source of the project (Apache Kafka) is known to all users and has guidelines around creating and maintaining a successful community.

A successful community is inclusive:

An inclusive community provides independence from commercial inﬂuence
Committer and PMC member diversity is the best way to maintain long-term independent project governance
Actively seek out new contributions with “low hanging” bugs; review patches quickly and thoughtfully
Encourage positive contributions; mentor new contributors to become committers and PMC members
Promote real-world stories of how project software helps end users

Overview

Please refer to the guidelines below for naming conventions and trademark usage when using Apache Kafka vs. Kafka in conjunction with Confluent branding.
We should never refer to Kafka in a way that Confluent either owns or controls the project.
Follow trademark attributions below where required.
Avoid using descriptors such as “lead,” “drive,” “roadmap previews,” etc. when referencing the project.
Only use the approved company boilerplate below in all online and print content.

Best Practices

When referring to Confluent’s role with regards to Apache Kafka, use the word “original” in front of anything that refers to creating or starting Apache Kafka. Example: “from/by the original creators of Apache Kafka®” and “from/by the team that originally created Apache Kafka” are acceptable, but the word “original” is critical.
Logo: the official logo must have “Apache” and “®” on it.
Language when describing Kafka (online, print, graphics) in reference to Confluent (this includes outbound marketing/SDR emails, training material, events, t-shirts, collateral, blogs, product UI and technical documentation, etc.) must clearly denote that Apache Kafka is developed at the vendor-independent Apache Software Foundation.
Avoid mixing Confluent and Kafka materials when possible, such as in the documentation.
Stay away from language like “Confluent employs the most committers or PMC members.”
Please note that these guidelines apply to personal blogs (keep in mind you are a Confluent employee so you must comply at all times).
Branding: here are examples that are OK to use when naming products:
- Ono-Sendai Console, Powered By Apache Steve
- Yoyodyne Accelerator For Apache CloudStack
- DO NOT say: VodaCoder Hadoop Accelerator or Apache Hadoop Nokion App
- We may not use ofﬁcial Apache project graphics/logos as part of our brand, but a “Powered By Apache” banded logo may be used to supplement our brand logo http://www.apache.org/foundation/marks/faq/#products
Future Apache Kafka releases: Use caution when talking about what might be in future releases of Apache Kafka. The Kafka community controls the release of new versions of Kafka, and Confluent has no official control over the Kafka backlog at all. Do not commit to specific functionality in a particular release, timing of the release or early access until Apache has released the new version of Kafka. It is OK to mention specific features that Confluent or our partners are working on and contributing to the official release, but do not commit to the actual release date or version. Check with Ismael Juma if you’re uncertain.
Future Confluent Platform or Confluent Cloud releases: Do not reference upcoming features that will be in CP or CC until they are released. Contact the PMM team with any questions. When talking about the future of Confluent Platform and the future of Apache Kafka simultaneously, it may be a helpful illustration to point out that Confluent controls the backlog and release cycle of Confluent Platform, but does not exercise that same control over Kafka. The Apache Kafka PMC votes and decides on future releases.

Public Speaking on Apache Projects

Apache Kafka, and all other Apache projects are open source, operating under ASF licensing. This means no one owns the project nor can claim ownership or power over it. That is, indeed, the nature of an open source project. You must keep this in mind and reflect it in all areas of your talk, including bios, titles, abstracts and the content itself. This includes events such as Meetups, Conferences, Keynotes, Webinars, Tech Talks, etc.
Include the following trademark attribution in your deck:
- “Apache, Apache Kafka, Kafka and the Kafka logo are trademarks of the Apache Software Foundation. The Apache Software Foundation has no affiliation with and does not endorse the materials provided at this event.”
Be familiar with the ASF rules of conduct: http://www.apache.org/foundation/policies/conduct.html.
The Apache Software Foundation owns all Apache-related trademarks, service marks, and graphic logos. Here are high res images and guidelines for any content you’re creating. http://www.apache.org/foundation/press/kit/.

Naming Guidelines

Summary

When in doubt, add “Apache” in front of “Kafka,” and include the ® trademark on the first appearance. You can refer to it as “Kafka” the second time and beyond in the body of the article or document.

Titles: Web Pages, Email Subject Lines, Collateral

“Apache” must be added to all mentions of “Kafka.”
If there is a subtitle, “Apache” also must be added to “Kafka.”
“Apache Kafka” must appear as Apache Kafka® in the first instance.

Body: Web Pages, Email Subject Lines, Collateral

The first instance of “Kafka” should have “Apache” in front of it.

Trademark Attributions

Proper trademark attributions must also be provided, either in page footers or in a clearly marked Terms, Legal, Trademarks or other commonly-named secondary page within a website

Web Page: Footers and Collateral

Add the following to the end of every footer web page:

Kafka Summit Web Page: Footers and Collateral

Add the following to the end of every footer web page:

Apache, Apache Kafka, Kafka and the Kafka logo are trademarks of the Apache Software Foundation. The Apache Software Foundation has no affiliation with and does not endorse the materials provided at this event.

Official Email from Confluent

Add the following as a footer to every email:

Official Email from Confluent for Kafka Summit Events

Add the following as a footer to every email:

In Confluent Collateral

Add the following as a footer at the end of every piece of collateral and hyperlink in PDFs:

Details on Trademark

Apache Kafka®
Add ® after “Apache Kafka” for the first mention of “Apache Kafka” in:
- The body of text within landing pages
- Collateral cover pages
- Swag
- Thumbnails of collateral
- First mention of Apache Kafka in email body
- Landing pages and first mention on web pages
- Ensure you have the new Kafka logo – provided below
No need for the ® in the title of a blog post