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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

USOC claims person continues to infringe on its trademarks.

The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) has filed a lawsuit (pdf) against Alan Bachand, an individual with whom the organization has a history when it comes to domain names.

Back in 2009 the USOC objected to Bachand’s use of the domain name OlympicsBestHotels.com to pitch hotels for the Vancouver Olympics. It ended up filing a UDRP against Bachand and won control of the domain.

Now the USOC is objecting to his use of the Olympics trademarks on a number of other sites, including SuperHotelRooms.com, 14sb.com, and LuxurySuperBowlHotels.com.

USOC says it reached out to Bachand about the infringing use, but he hasn’t made all of the changes it requested.

Its suit claims that Bachand is violating the Olympic and Amateur Sports Act and the Lanham Act.

In the UDRP all Bachand lost was his domain name. With a lawsuit, he could face financial penalties if he loses.

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Sites claim to be news for the 99%.

The Chicago Tribune Company has filed a complaint with World Intellectual Property Organization over “occupy” web sites using its brand.

The complaint targets occupiedchicagotribune.org and occupychicagotribune.org, the former of which is a web site that states “We’re proud to have no affiliation whatsoever with the 1% Chicago Tribune or the Tribune Co.”.

The site states:

The Occupied Chicago Tribune is an independent media source for those who do not see their struggles and views represented in the mainstream press. We created this paper to provide an outlet for reporting, commentary and analysis on the growing Occupy movement, its unique application in our city and the struggles of the 99%.

These “occupiers” are going to flip out even more against the man when they learn about trademark law.

The Occupied Chicago Tribune also links to similar sites, including Occupied Wall Street Journal and Occupied Oakland Tribune.

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Jeweler files claim over six domain registrations.

Jewelry company Tacori Enterprises has sued Oversee.net in U.S. District Court for cybersquatting.

Tacori alleges (pdf) that Oversee.net is cybersquatting with at least six domain names:

Taccori.com
Tacorri.com
Tacoriiv.com
TacoriRings.com
Tacoti.com
Tracori.com

Tacori alleges that Oversee.net “is a serial cybersquatter who registers, uses, and traffics in domain names that are confusingly similar to famous or distinctive trademarks owned by others, including Tacori trademarks.” It also alleges that Oversee.net intentionally failed to maintain accurate whois records for the domains.

Tacori is represented by Howard Kroll and David Steele of Christie, Parker, and Hale, LLP. The two are no strangers to cybersquatting lawsuits; they’ve represented Verizon in multiple cases.

When asked for comment, Oversee.net responded “We are reviewing the lawsuit and plan to defend our position vigorously.”

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Mayor and his son accused of hacking into email and then illegally accessing GoDaddy account to cancel domain name registration.

West New York mayor Felix Roque and his son were arrested after allegedly working together to hack into an email account to gain access to a GoDaddy account and take down a domain name related to a recall effort against the mayor.

The complaint alleges that Roque’s son, Joseph Roque, was first able to compromise the email address for the owner of RecallRoque.com. Once he had access to the email he then was able to reset the password on the GoDaddy account that held the domain name. He subsequently logged in to cancel the registration, taking the recall web site down.

The complaint also alleges that the pair accessed communications from the registrant’s email account to harass people who were contributing information to Roque’s recall campaign.

It’s a rather fascinating read about how someone used the internet to figure out how to hack into an email account, and subsequently access a registrar account.

Forget worrying about losing your job as mayor. How does ending up in the slammer sound?

[note: the title of this post was updated to avoid confusion. The mayor's son compromised an email account which was then used to do a password reset at GoDaddy.]

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Republican National Committee registers Cory Booker domains and creates petition sites.

Ever since Newark, New Jersey mayor and super-hero Cory Booker kinda-sorta-maybe got on the Obama campaign’s case for attacking Mitt Romney on his Bain record, Republicans everywhere have been rejoicing.

That includes the Republican National Committee, which just registered the domain names IStandWithCory.com and IStandwithCoryBooker.com and has created a web site for them.

The web site asks people to sign a petition saying “Don’t let the Obama campaign silence support for job creation.”

I’m not quite sure who is against job creation, but that’s how the spin doctors are working it out.

Of course, the Republicans don’t stand with Booker on other issues that they care about. Like gay marriage.

Maybe they should have registered IStandwithCoryBookerOnaNegativeCampaigningIssueButNotMuchElse.com

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Baylor University gets “sucks” domain back after letting it expire.

It’s pretty easy to sit down here in Austin and say that Baylor sucks.

You can get on its case for yanking a gay student’s scholarship. And for waiting until the 90s to lift a ban on dancing on campus.

There’s also that little fact that the school is in Waco.

(The one thing we can’t do any more is say that its sports programs suck.)

But now the university is claiming a bit of suckiness itself: BaylorSucks.com

Baylor University is the proud new owner of this domain name — for the second time — after winning a dispute at National Arbitration Forum for the domain.

As more proof of its suckiness, Baylor used to own the domain name BaylorSucks.com. Had it not let the domain name expire in 2008 then it wouldn’t have had to file a complaint in the first case.

You can legitimately own domains like BaylorSucks.com if you do it to criticize the university and not profit from the site. But the owner of the domain merely parked it.

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

When you know it’s time to select a different company name…

A Colorado company just lost a UDRP for Qwizzle.com, and it’s a great example of botched company naming.

The company, Qwizzle, LLC, knew that Qwizzle.com was taken when it came up with its name. It tried to contact the owner of Qwizzle.com but had no luck. It still decided to launch its business as Qwizzle but then filed a UDRP to try to get the domain name.

It lost the UDRP because Qwizzle.com was registered before it came up with the name for its online real estate company.

I started to research where I could find Qwizzle on the web. When I Google “quizzle”, the first two results are from Facebook and Twitter respectively. Then there’s Qwizzle.co, which resolved to a blank page save for the company’s favicon. This domain appears to be owned by Qwizzle.co. Quizzle.us looks like the actual site for the company, although it’s registered to someone in Michigan.

I noticed Qwizzle.net was registered, too. Surprisingly, it’s registered by Quicken Loans. Quicken has a site called Quizzle.com, and apparently there was some confusion as to how to spell it so they picked up the Qwizzle.net name as well.

That should have been a huge red flag for Qwizzle, LLC. If people are confused that Quizzle.com might be spelled Qwizzle.com, then certainly it can be the other way around. And Quicken Loans offers mortgage loans — which is too close for comfort to a real estate site.

If I were this company I would have just gone with another name (and domain).

Qwizzle wants to disrupt the traditional home marketing and real estate business. It’s a laudable goal, but they need to pick a different name.

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

File sharing company files IP lawsuit over trademarks.

BitTorrent (and especially its users) are familiar with intellectual property lawsuits. But usually they’re on the receiving end.

Now the tables are turned. BitTorrent, Inc. has filed a federal lawsuit in California against BitTorrent Marketing GMBH for trademark infringement and cybersquatting.

According to BitTorrent, Inc. founder Bram Cohen, he first became aware of the defendant when it contacted him in 2003 and asked for permission to register the Bittorrent.de domain name. Cohen refused. The defendant went ahead and registered a lot of related domain names (including the .de domain) and managed to secure trademark registrations for the BitTorrent mark in Germany and Europe. When BitTorrent, Inc. tried to get its own trademarks in Europe, the defendant filed a petition to oppose BitTorrent, Inc’s trademark applications.

BitTorrent, Inc initiated litigation in Germany against BitTorrent Marketing GMBH in 2010. Now BitTorrent is bringing a case against the firm in the U.S.

According to Cohen’s lawsuit, the German company has registered hundreds of domain names that include “Bittorent”, such as the typo bitorrent.com, bittorrent.net, and bittorrent.de.

BitTorrent, Inc also says that the defendant has a history of bad activity in file sharing. It alleges the defendant has tried to usurp trademarks owned by other file sharing companies such as Kazaa and Morpheus.

Cohen’s company is suing for federal trademark infringement and cybersquatting, among other claims. On the cybersquatting claims it is asking for $100,000 per infringing domain name. Both the defendant and the respondent have filed cybersquatting claims in the past, but not against each other.

You can read the lawsuit here (large PDF).

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Don’t forget to prove earlier rights if you claim them.

Publisher Hidden Values has lost a dispute over the domain name TriangleKidsDirectory.com.

Hidden Values publishes the Kids’ Directory. It also has a registered trademark for KID’S DIRECTORY.

It’s an admittedly weak mark. It’s even a concurrent use registration that is limited in geographic scope.

But, the registrant of the domain name was a former licensee of Kids Directory and published the directory in the North Carolina “triangle”. And he didn’t respond to the dispute. So the odds were tipped in Hidden Values’ favor.

Regardless of what you think of the merits of this case and if UDRP is the proper venue for it, the case seems to have come down to when Hidden Values got trademark rights in “Kid’s Directory”. And this is where the company screwed up.

Hidden Values’ complaint mentions that it started using the mark in 1990. That’s the first-use-in-commerce date on its trademark application. But the trademark application wasn’t filed until 2005, after the respondent registered the TriangleKidsDirectory.com domain name. It should have been easy for the lawyer to show some common law rights previous to 2005 that would have been acceptable to the panel, but he dropped the ball:

“In the instant proceeding, Complainant has provided no documentary or other evidence to support the date of first use in Commerce referenced in its trademark application. This Panel therefore finds there to be a lack of evidentiary basis by which it might reasonably conclude that Complainant held rights in the KID’S DIRECTORY trademark prior to the May 12, 1995 [sic] date on which Respondent registered the disputed domain name.”

Had the company’s lawyer provided what should have been easy proof, I bet the company wins this case.

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Originally posted by Domain Name Wire

Request for .xxx domain name denied.

United Kingdom insurance company BGL Group Limited, better known as CompareTheMarket.com, is the first complainant to lose a UDRP for a .xxx domain name.

The company filed the complaint against UK resident Jon Watkins, who registered the domain back in December when .xxx became generally available.

But as I’ve argued previously, it can be rather difficult to prove bad faith in the registration of a .xxx domain name. Most complainants aren’t in the adult entertainment business. And few .xxx domain names will be parked, which could have result in PPC ads related to a complainant. So unless the mark is very famous (and not descriptive/generic) or the owner of the domain tries to sell the domain to the complainant, proving registration in bad faith isn’t easy.

That’s what happened here. A Czech Arbitration Court panel wrote:

But Complainant fails to prove bad faith registration or use of the domain. Complainant states that the domain is “completely inactive”. Complainant does not show that Respondent tried to sell the domain to Complainant, has registered other infringing names, or otherwise has tried to profit from the domain or cause any other harm to Complainant. Respondent is not shown to have had prior UDRP cases in which he has been an unsuccessful Defendant. Clearly, “compare the market” could relate to myriad different types of markets and myriad different comparisons within each one, as demonstrated by a simple web search.

I’m not quite sure why BGL went after this domain name. If it were an active domain name with porn on it and it was getting search rankings I’d understand. Otherwise this seems like a waste of money.

Companies have filed over 20 UDRP cases against .xxx domain names. None had lost prior to this case.

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