I am starting a youtube channel for arduino based projects. Can i use the name 'arduino' as a part for the name of my youtube channel? For ex- "arduino zone". As arduino is a brand name. And maybe it can be a copyright issue, but not sure about that.
A perfect question for your lawyer.
A lot depends on the commercial aspect.
Do you expect to make money from it ?
Arduino is something of a niche market so I would not expect to see a lot of hits.
There are a few FB groups using the "Arduino" in the title that are quite active and AFAIK they have not been hit with any cease and desist orders.
Clearly trying to "misrepresent yourself" as affiliated with or part of the official Arduino platform could draw unwanted legal attention but as a personal venture then from my POV there is no harm.
There is more documentation available for this aspect on this site so maybe you want to dig around a little more and catch up on what Arduino organisation expect from people using the name and or logo's.
I've wondered about something similar: The use of the word Arduino in naming 3rd party libraries or other software. In the case of free software, I doubt Arduino would ever take action as there are a ton of projects named this way and it would likely result in a lot of negative feelings from the community. However, I would prefer to play by the rules. I used the name Arduino in a couple of my projects but I'm trying to avoid that now.
I did recently listen to an episode of the Amp Hour Podcast where someone mentioned they used Arduino in the name of something they did and were contacted by Arduino and asked to change it. I don't remember the exact details. I think it was either a YouTube channel or a blog. I might be wrong about that but I know it wasn't hardware because that wouldn't have been remarkable. I thought it was this episode where I heard it:
but I scanned through it and didn't hear it. I know it was one of the oldest interview episodes (not one of the episodes where it's only Chris Gammell and Dave Jones or Jeff Keyzer chatting). That was back in 2011.
@Per
So that would probably be "pre upset" etc.
I cannot see issues with such as "Arduino Fly Catcher Group" or "Death Ray Arduino Society" where it seems clear its not part and parcel of the organisation but some form of tangential group that uses Arduino's in the work they do.