Has anyone seen a source that presents the dispute from the view of Smart Projects / Gianluca?
Also, for those interested (not sure if it's posted here yet) here's the lawsuit https://www.unitedstatescourts.org/federal/mad/167131/
Thanks for the words pickle9000.
On the face of it, looks like a slam dunk for Arduino LLC... but then we have not seen the defense.
The informal email chain does not prove much, except to show there should have been formally entered contracts, but that wasn't done. Organisation, and payments, done on the nod it seems.
And as the fact that Arduino LLC apparently let Smart Projects file a trademark, and then stop payments, without doing much about it, I wonder how the court view that. Technically, Smart Projects own the trademark, and have been selling "Arduino" boards without a legal challenge by the LLC until now. I would have expected cease and desist letters to everyone selling "illegal marked" boards. Arduino LLC are obviously amateurs, and it shows.
I'll agree with Dave, looks expensive.
I probably was unfair on Adafruit. It seems that the official distributors (some anyway) have not been informed about dispute at Arduno, only heard from Martino about some changes in distribution. It appears Banzi has not told anyone not to sell boards from Smart Projects, despite his talk of "fighting for Arduino".
Then I additionally discovered the history of Wiring and Arduino - Barragan's and other's work, and there are some unanswered questions over Banzi's role as supervisor, then later exploiting the student's work.
On the subject of Open Source, I don't see this as a failure of an OS business model. Arduino LLC were (are) actually doing very well with a Open Source software (IDE and libraries), and Open Source hardware. The cheap clones have not killed them, arguably they are a benefit. It's because there is now a valuable business, that the founders can afford a legal fight. The dispute is over the one thing that is not open, i.e. the trademark.
Really this is a story of a thousand small businesses where the original founders fall out over the direction of the company (and profits thereof), and end up fighting for control.
In the end then, I conclude it's best to leave Arduino #1 and Arduino #2 sort it out by themselves (or die trying). It may result in two viable companies carrying the Arduino name, Arduino(software) and Arduino(hardware). Or, a big heap and someone will pick up the pieces...
In the meantime, even according to Banzi, we should pursue "business as usual".
Ps. a final amusement from Arduino.org :
Trademarks
Would you like to report a trademarks violation? trademarks@arduino.org