Does anybody know whether one is allowed to use these trademarks in our own examples or documentations? The wikipedia page does not mention this. Maybe someone already did this and already researched it.
At the moment I need nice example html-newsletters I can show in the manual for my software, but marketing etc. also need nice sample names and I like the "Adventure Works Bike Shop"
MS has moved the sample databases to CodePlex, and the licensing info is there: http://msftdbprodsamples.codeplex.com/license
From that page:
Grant of Rights
(A) Copyright Grant- Subject to the terms of this license, including the license conditions and limitations in section 3, each contributor grants you a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free copyright license to reproduce its contribution, prepare derivative works of its contribution, and distribute its contribution or any derivative works that you create.
(B) Patent Grant- Subject to the terms of this license, including the license conditions and limitations in section 3, each contributor grants you a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license under its licensed patents to make, have made, use, sell, offer for sale, import, and/or otherwise dispose of its contribution in the software or derivative works of the contribution in the software.
AND
Conditions and Limitations
(A) No Trademark License- This license does not grant you rights to use any contributors' name, logo, or trademarks.
(B) If you bring a patent claim against any contributor over patents that you claim are infringed by the software, your patent license from such contributor to the software ends automatically.
(C) If you distribute any portion of the software, you must retain all copyright, patent, trademark, and attribution notices that are present in the software.
(D) If you distribute any portion of the software in source code form, you may do so only under this license by including a complete copy of this.
IANAL, but it seems like you do have some ability use this content. You probably need to make sure you disclose that you're using MS's sample databases and include their licensing boilerplate if you redistribute the DBs themselves -- but you might want to get some expert opinion rather than the speculation of another developer!