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I'm designing a logo inspired by the MDN logo.
My logo (inside the green zone) has nothing to do with the "dinosaur" logo of Mozilla. So the question is about the frame and the arrangement of the letters (IJK in my case).
Is it plagiarism if my logo looks similar to an existing one?
I was previously familiar with the MDN logo, but no your logo did not come to mind when I saw yours. Is it plagiarism? Yes, if you used the MDN logo for inspiration then yes I'd say that's plagiarism. But not a very serious case of it.
Is it highly unethical? It depends, but probably not. A rounded rectangle with a thick black stroke isn't exactly groundbreaking design work. Is it at all unethical? Maybe a little. Mimicry is widespread in the design world. Without it, we wouldn't have design trends. If it helps you sleep at night, you can refer to it as "inspiration" instead of plagiarism.
Is it a copyright violation? I'm not a lawyer, but I'd say no. Here's a good article on this sort of thing:
Trademark, Copyright and Logos
In order for a work to have copyright protection, it must reach a requisite level of creativity. Many logos, however, do not. Since copyright can’t protect a name, colors or the design of the logo, most simple logos simply do not have the required level of creativity to be considered copyrightable. However, many ornate or artistic ones do.
What we have here is not particularly ornate or artistic. As long as your omitted logo is 100% yours, I think you're on the safe side of things.
There are lots of existing logos out there that share similarities, for companies that are presumably much bigger than yours.
Did you use the MDN-logo as a template? Or does Google suggest the both as similar to each other?
I think the probability that people will not perceive it as plagiarism depends on the extent of perceivable differences. So I tried some analysis (as far as it was possible, if the actual logo has to be an absolute mystery):
...but there is something left that cannot be commented, because your (real) logo is still absolutely invisible to us...
Last but not least, I have to admit, that your design doesn't convince me. And I guess that your answer to my first counter question would be yes.
I would agree with JohnB here, no, it is not plagiarism. As long as your logo image is not particularly similar to the MDN dino, I would say you are good.
I did not "click" your logo to the MDN either, this is a very good thing for everyone concerned: sometimes logos trigger associations that may not be good; depending on what the logo is for (say; a logo for a builders store that may be very similar to a children's TV-logo. It would be hard to take the builders store seriously).
It is a tricky area, certainly, but in the undying words of HHG2TG: don´t panic :-)
