Pulse trademark and brand usage.

1. What the project trademark covers.

The following are reserved for the Pulse project:

• The wordmark: the name "Pulse" written as a single word, in any typography, when used to identify the project.
• The logo: the geometric P+spark mark visible in /og-home.png and in the footer of every page on this site.
• The combination: the Pulse wordmark and the P+spark mark used together, as a single brand identity.
• Plain text references to "Pulse" in editorial copy are covered by the fair-use rules in Section 3, not by the trademark reservation itself.

2. What is not trademarked.

Trademark protection does not extend to the underlying technology. The following are free for anyone to use under the project's source license:

• The source code, configuration, and documentation (covered by the source license).
• The wire protocol: the HTTP calls between Pulse and a local model runtime (Ollama-compatible).
• The compiled binary artifacts (the Windows installer, the Android APK) — re-distributable under the source license.
• The project name as a generic noun in unrelated contexts (for example, a medical device called "pulse oximeter" or a music application called "Pulse Trainer").

Anyone can build, fork, or redistribute Pulse under the source license. The trademark exists to identify the official Pulse project — not to restrict what people do with the code.

3. Allowed uses of the Pulse name.

The following are explicitly allowed without prior permission:

• Editorial references. Blog posts, articles, reviews, podcasts, and video essays may refer to the project as "Pulse" in plain text. The customary one-liner is: Pulse is a local-first AI side panel for Windows and Android.
• Linking to the project. Articles and pages may link to ownlocalml.com or to the public repository and label the destination as the official project.
• Distributing unmodified binaries. The official Windows installer and Android APK may be mirrored and re-distributed, provided attribution is preserved and the binaries are not modified.
• Plugins and extensions. A third-party plugin or extension for Pulse may be published under its own name, with a clear "unofficial" or "community" label so users do not mistake it for the official project.
• Forks. A fork may use the Pulse source code but must pick a different name (for example, "Pulse Plus", "PulseEDU", or "PulseMirror") and must not imply endorsement by the original project.
• Academic and research papers. Pulse may be cited in publications, benchmarks, and case studies in the same way as any other source-available tool.

4. Prohibited uses of the Pulse name.

The following are not allowed without prior written permission:

• Naming a competing or unrelated product "Pulse", "Pulse-X", "Pulse Pro", "Pulse Studio", or any name that begins with "Pulse" — even when paired with a "trademark disclaimer".
• Using the P+spark logo on a product, service, or web page in a way that suggests official endorsement of something the project has not endorsed.
• Implying that a fork, mod, or repackaged build is the official Pulse. The phrase "Pulse 2.0" without a "(forked)" or "(modified)" qualifier on the same surface is not allowed.
• Using "Pulse" inside a paid product name, paid bundle, or paid service tier (for example, "Pulse Premium" inside a third-party subscription).
• Domain squatting: registering pulse.io, pulse-app.com, pulse-ai.com, pulsesidebar.com, or any similar domain that could be confused with the official project. The official domain is ownlocalml.com.
• Modifying the P+spark logo (changing colours, proportions, or adding elements such as shadows, glows, or extra geometry) and using the result as if it were the official mark.

5. Logo usage rules.

The P+spark mark is the geometric icon shown in the footer of this site. The following rules apply whenever the mark is reproduced:

Colours.

• The mark itself is rendered in the project purple #bb9af7.
• The mark is designed for a dark surface. Use it on #1a1b26 (the project background) or on a similarly dark, low-saturation surface.
• Do not recolour the mark to brand colours of another product. Do not invert the geometry into a different composition.

Geometry.

• Do not rotate, mirror, skew, or otherwise distort the mark.
• Do not crop the mark. Always render it in full, with the spark visible.
• Do not place the mark on a busy photographic background. Use a solid dark surface; an untextured dark card is fine.

Size.

• On screen, the mark must be at least 24 px on its longest side.
• In print, the mark must be at least 0.5 inch (12.7 mm) on its longest side.
• Do not add effects: no drop shadows, no glow, no gradient fill that is not present in the original. Use the original flat geometry.

Source files.

The current source-of-truth for the mark is /og-home.png (PNG, 1200x630, generated for the open-graph card). When the /press/ kit ships with dedicated SVG variants, that kit will become the canonical source and this page will link to it.

6. Trademark enforcement.

The Pulse trademark is protected to keep the project identifiable — not to be aggressive. If misuse is spotted, the common response is a name-change request, not a legal threat.

If a name-change request is ignored, or if the misuse is commercial in nature (paid products, advertising, or impersonation), legal action may be considered. That step is reserved for cases where the request is ignored or where downstream users are likely to be confused.

7. Contact.

Trademark questions, name-change requests, and reports of misuse are handled on the public issue tracker:

Open a trademark issue on GitHub. If the trademark template is not available in the issue picker, file a regular issue and prefix the title with [trademark].

No support email is published. The project does not operate a trademark hotline or a trademark intake form outside the repository.