UNIX® was registered by Bell Laboratories as a trademark for computer operating systems. Today this mark is owned by Open Group, who are happy to tell you about how they would like it to be used.
I decided to gather whatever not-our-Unix items I could; here is the current harvest. Other sightings and scans gratefully accepted.
When you look up the four letters in the search engines of the US Patent and Trademark Office, you find many products that use the name in some way. Many clearly refer to the OS, but others seem independent. For example, to clip one out, we find
Word Mark: UNIX DIAPERS BY PANNOLINI
Translation: The english translation of PANNOLINI is "diapers".
Owner Name: (REGISTRANT) Pannolini de Mexico, S.A. de C.V.
Disclaimer: NO CLAIM IS MADE TO THE EXCLUSIVE RIGHT TO USE "DIAPERS" and
"PANNOLINI" APART FROM THE MARK AS SHOWN
Evidently, there are various products bearing the Unix name that are completely unrelated to computer software, and their manufacturers seem to have invented the same name independently. Some, like the diapers, are recorded in the US; the ones below are advertised, delivered, or photographed products from around the world.
The Pannolini Unix diapers are not a mere will o' the wisp; one correspondent supplied an image of the box, and the current owner of this instance of the name responded to mail to their webmaster. See below for the pic and the tale.
Brett of BNL bought the 1.35l model in a Japanese super market in Fort Lee,
NJ (discount price USD4.59) and sent a scan, omitted here.
I showed a prototype of this page to Brian Kernighan, and he forthwith dug
into his files and found the original version of a different ad for the same
product. This page is getting too graphics-rich, so I won't display it
separately. It lacks the quotable phrases from the one displayed.
Another photo of the same product was sent by Tommi Hassinen, of the University of Kuopio, likewise in Finland.
This Italian company seems to have strong marketing in Scandinavia.
More recently, Mark Horton, long at Bell Labs and now with Avaya, kindly sent an unopened package of five UNIX 2001 ballpoint pens, purchased in the US. It seems to be from the same company, so they sell here as well.
Others keep seeing their products: e.g. Brad Knowles, who commends the
company's line of highlighter
pens.
Fazal Majid captured the large photo during a visit to Caen, France around 1994; it depicts a poster on the wall of a flower shop. Just after he sent it to me, he alerted me to the home site of the product; the second picture is captured from there. He and I were both charmed by "There are those who take risks, and those who take UNIX." This UNIX home page is wonderful. It even has a check-off box for "For how long have you used UNIX?"
When Majid sent the first image, I guessed (perhaps hoped) that the anti-fungal properties of the product were intended for the personal, perhaps intimate, use of the nouvelle génération. It is in fact a product for fungal diseases of wheat and barley.
Christian Lefebvre recently sent another ad image for the same product (not
shown), but we both like the main text words: "Unix en granulé dispersable, la
formulation de l'avenir," or "Unix in dispersible pellets, the formulation for
the future."
Andy Ward subsequently sent along an image of a UK ad for (presumably) the
same product. It advises us that "UNIX® [is] the essential partner for eyespot
or rynchosporium control in barley." Well said.
Dick Snippe of the Netherlands took a photo of a box containing a Unix TV antenna. It was outside a shop on the main street of Kerman, in eastern Iran. If you look carefully, you'll see that it comes "with mixer," and on the page from which I captured the image, the caption (tr. from Dutch) asks "Yes, Unix WITH mixer! Does linux come with a mixer?"
For sake of conserving space I cropped out a poster of Khatami, the relatively moderate President of Iran. Dick remarked in e-mail that one could detect the political sympathies of shops' proprietors by seeing which leaders' portraits were displayed. This one, he observed, was evidently rather liberal, since the more conservative leaders didn't appear at all. Other shops often have smaller pictures of the more conservative leaders, even if the largest is of Khatami.
Dick also reports that attempts to engage the shopkeeper about the fine points of Unix antennas or operating systems failed for lack of common language.
Thanks to Wilco Noordermeer for sending the initial pointer.
JC van Winkel uncovered a much more extensive Unix massage connection, specifically a Unix Massage Chair, which claims that "The Unix 501 offers the tapping, kneading, and rolling massage of a professional massage therapist." If this link stops working, a WWW search will turn up many more suppliers of these chairs.
And if you want more personal attention and an actual massage therapist, the UNIX Massage Shop, based in North Hollywood, CA, offers chair massage done by human attendants instead of gadgetry in the chair.
Maybe they didn't sell well. www.rodenstock.com does feature their eyeglass products, but have deemphasized the Unix brand to the point of invisibility.
Thanks to Frank Mango for the pointer and the image.
Istvan tells me that Autóalkatrészek does mean auto parts, and that their slogan És az autó biztosan megy tovább... is approximately "And the car keeps on going well..."
A mystery awaited unveiling, so I sent e-mail to the webmaster of the Drypers WWW site, and received the following response, both satisfyingly detailed and friendly:
Drypers corporation bought Panollini in 1995. Pannolini previously sold diapers under the Unix name, and we bought all rights to the name. We have been selling under the Unix by Drypers logo. Unix is a takeoff on "unisex" which means diapers for both boys and girls. Prior to 1995 almost all diapers were sold in boys or girls versions, but all companies switched to unisex about that time. There are many derivations throughout the world. Proctor and Gamble sells "Uni" in many locations, for example. None of this has anything to do with Unix computers.
The colored spots aren't Xmas lights; he believes they owe to X-ray damage to his film at the airport.
From much further south, Wanderlei Antonio Cavassin pointed me to a similar,
but evidently a bigger enterprise in São Paulo, Brazil: the Unix Cabeleireiro, which
seems to be a much tonier place. It continues the tradition of Unisex, Unix, and
haircare.
Jordi promises to investigate, but the door was locked when he visited.