A one member UDRP panel has just awarded a pretty generic domain name StocktonGolf.com to StocktonEnterprises, Inc. a company owned and operated by professional golfer, Dave Stockton, a 10-time PGA Tour winner and a 14-time Champions Tour winner.
The panel rejected that the domain represented the city of Stockton and terms related to Golf.
The panel found that the ““Stockton” name is, and has been, synonymous with professional golf since at least the early 1970s and awarded the domain to him based off a finding of a common law trademark.
The Panel rejected the domain holders argument that it has been using the disputed domain name in connection with a bona fide offering of goods or services.
Here are the relevant findings by the Panel:
“The service being offered is Internet Advertising. Much like the Yellow Pages® provides visibility for print advertisers, the Respondent company provides visibility for Internet advertisers. The Respondent started its commercial activities in 1999. Its principals had been raising and competing with English Setter hunting dogs on a national level for several years. Throughout the summer and fall of 1998, they had been discussing how they could most effectively and economically bring national exposure for a local product, like their English Setters. That discussion of a private business gradually evolved into a much more global discussion of how people from around the world could get exposure for their products across a much wider global area. In the late winter of 1998, the early discussion of resolving the problem of global recognition and exposure for a local product took a turn in a new direction as they began to learn and realize how a “global” medium like the Internet could help nearly any business sell their goods and services. The solution to the global marketing problem eventually emerged as the ability of small and large businesses to economically promote their offerings in a network of advertising and information websites concentrated in the areas of real estate, hunting, fishing, dogs, travel, and golf. While the Respondent registered some generic websites like <dogforsale.com> and <pheasanthunt.com>, it mostly registered geographic domain names, such as <huntnorthdakota.com>, <northdakotahunt.com>, <minnesotahunt.com>, <huntminnesota.com>, <dickinsonrealestate.com>, <topekagolf.com>, <bismarckgolf.com>, <stocktongolf.com>, etc.”
“The Respondent states that the website at the disputed domain name contains the following statement:
“Welcome to www.stocktongolf.com. A Global network directory of Stockton golf. Golf courses, tee times, golf shops, supplies, equipment, golf real estate and related products and services.…
Facebook, Inc. has just filed a UDRP with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) to gain control of the domain name Facebook.info
The domain Facebook.info was 1st registered in 2004.
The domain is not parked, but rather has a choice of taking you to its Twitter account or to something its calls Forum.Facebook.info
Many of the posts on the “forum” have such titles as “Copy Breitling Emergency Watch For Sale”, download Friends With Benefits, and “Watch Bad Teacher Online” certainly things Facebook, Inc wouldn’t want to appear to be involved in.
It look like the owner of the domain name has owned the domain and used it in the same fashion since at least 2005 and other than its IPO I’m not sure what has changed that has caused Facebook to finally wake up and file a UDRP on the domain.
The case number is D2012-1008
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Alton Flanders represented by John Berryhill, just beat back a UDRP on his domain name CondomWorld.com
The complaint was bought by Nicholas Perez who claimed he owned an US Trademark on the term CONDOM WORLD and common law rights to the term.
The complaint said he uses the term as the name of retail stores that sell condoms and other adult-oriented products in Puerto Rico.
Here are the relevant facts and findings from the one man Panel said:
“”There can be no bad faith registration of the domain name because no evidence has been presented that Complainant had rights in a trademark or common law mark at the time the domain name was registered. ”
“Furthermore, no evidence was presented that Respondent could have had, or did have, knowledge of Complainant’s business at the time the domain name was registered.
“Respondent registered the domain name in 1996.”
“Complainant has not presented evidence that he held either trademark rights or common law rights in the CONDOM WORLD mark as of the date the domain name was registered.”
” Moreover, there is no evidence that Respondent had any knowledge of Complainant in 1996 when Respondent registered the domain name. Under these circumstances, there can be no bad faith registration of the domain name.”
“Generally speaking, although a trademark can form a basis for a UDRP action under the first element irrespective of its date. . .when a domain name is registered by the respondent before the complainant’s relied-upon trademark right is shown to have been first established (whether on a registered or unregistered basis), the registration of the domain name would not have been in bad faith because the registrant could not have contemplated the complainant’s then non-existent right.”
Accordingly, it is Ordered that the <condomworld.com> domain name REMAIN WITH Respondent.
Bruce E. Meyerson, Panelist…
In memo sent by head of ICANN’s Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC), Steve Metalitz On May 9th, which asks ICANN to reconsider its ‘digital archery’ (DA) methodology for new gTLD batching.
Here is the full memo:
TO: ICANN Board New gTLD Program Committee
FROM: Steve Metalitz, IPC President
RE: “Digital Archery” batching method
DT: May 9, 2012
I write at the direction of the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC), to urge ICANN to reconsider use of the “digital archery” method for batching new gTLD applications for evaluations.
On May 4, ICANN announced that over 2000 new gTLD applications have been received. Since the evaluation system is only designed to handle about 500 applications at once, it is clear now that batching is not just a theoretical possibility, but a necessity, at least under the evaluation system ICANN has adopted.
The “digital archery” batching method announced by the ICANN Board on March 28 is complex, untried, and readily subject to gaming. The paralysis of ICANN’s new gTLD application system (TAS), resulting from a so-called “glitch” that ICANN failed to detect in testing the TAS, has now persisted for nearly a month, with no defined end in sight. This episode inescapably casts doubt on ICANN’s capacity to implement another technically complex system for batching evaluation of applications. Another such “glitch” in the earliest stages of the most ambitious and far-reaching project ICANN has ever undertaken would permanently damage the organization’s credibility, and likely call into question its continued viability as the steward of the domain name system.
The possibilities for gaming the “digital archery” process are obvious and manifold. Inevitably, it will serve as yet another revenue extraction opportunity for those entities that are managing and promoting new gTLD applications. We are already seeing this happen. See http://www.pool.com/gtld/digitalarchery.aspx. This arcane and seemingly arbitrary batching method will also reinforce the widespread impression that all ICANN procedures are dominated by “insiders” with contractual relationships to ICANN, who will surely know best how to manipulate this initiative to their own benefit, or that of their paying customers. It is difficult to reconcile such an outcome with ICANN’s obligation to act in the public interest.
Whether or not the ICANN staff presented to the Board any options to the “digital archery” proposal before the March 28 decision, the fact is that alternatives were suggested by the community that would have avoided the serious pitfalls and risks – including but by no means limited to those mentioned above – of the method the Board chose.
TechCrunch.com just covered the site Live Bookings which TechCrunch referred to as the Opentable.com of Europe.
The company just picked up $24 Million more in funding bringing it total capital raised by the company to $62 Million dollars.
The London based company, in a Press Release clearly laid out its plans to use the domain name FreeBookings.com in the US for its online reservation system or the equivalent of its Live Bookings site in the Europe
Live Bookings bought the domain name FreeBookings.com for just $3,900 in November 2011.
The seller is a domainer.
The company started with the domain name LiveBookings.net and that is still the official site listed by CrunchBase.
However
We write these stories from time to time not to embarrass or to make the sellers of the domain feel badly for missing out on a big payday but to educate.
The bottom line is you don’t know who might be interested in buying your domain and any chance you have to figure it completely disappears when the domain is listed with a Buy It Now (BIN) option, as this domain was.
There are even those who feel we have sold domains way too cheap.
A blogger wrote last week about our meet.me sale for 450,000 who felt we could have gotten seven figures or more for the domain and quite possible we could have.
At the end of the day its virtually impossible to fetch the maximum price a buyer is willing to spent.
We are not privy to their budget or plans for the domain.
As a domain owner need to put yourself in the best position to know who your buyer could be.
Its one thing to walk away with mid-six figures for a domain that may have fetched 7 figures and quite another to walk away with just a few thousand.
So here is another cautionary tale of putting domains up for sale with a small BIN price only to find out months later that the buyer has tens of millions in the bank.
Ouch…
The domain name registry that operates the .CA ccTLD, Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA), announced today that the .CA domain is turning 25 years old. The very first .CA domain name was registered to the University of Prince Edward Island in 1988. Currently there are 1,925,775 domains registered under .CA.
It was on this day back in 1987 that the .CA domain extension was officially delegated by Jon Postel, operator of Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), to John Demco at the University of British Columbia (UBC).
Demco and a group of volunteers ran the .CA domain registry for 13 years. From 1987 to 2000, those volunteers at UBC registered almost 60,000 domain names. Since 2000, the registry for .CA domain names has been run by the Ottawa-based Canadian Internet Registration Authority. CIRA’s President and CEO Byron Holland said:
“We owe a debt to the visionaries who set up .CA in the 1980s. While many people today may take the Internet for granted, the fact is, without the foresight of people like John Demco, the Internet might not have developed as we now know it… The growth in both the size of the registry and in the role .CA plays in Canadians’ lives bodes well for the next 25 years of .CA. As we move more and more of our lives online, .CA is becoming the ‘flag on the virtual backpack’ for hundreds of thousands of Canadians.”
Back in 1987 when the .CA ccTLD was introduced the world wide web was a very different place. Very few Canadians were online, and until 1990 only governments and the academic community were able to register .CA domains. Today, .CA is an integral part of the Canadian economic and social landscape. Now with more than 1.9 million domain names registered, .CA is the world’s 14th-largest domain registry, and it has the fourth-highest growth rate over the past five years.
On April 15, 2008, CIRA registered it’s one millionth .CA domain name. The next big celebration is right around the corner it seems. In another few weeks give or take, they will be celebrating the two millionth .CA domain registration which will be another huge milestone for the Canadian ccTLD.
The registry has also just opened their nominations for their 2012 Board Elections.
Related posts:
A UDRP has been filed for another three letter .com domain name
The UDRP was filed by Albir Hills Resort, S.A. against the domain SHA.com
SHA.com is owned by Telepathy, Inc.
The complainant does own a federal US Trademark on the term SHA with a filing date of July 27, 2007 and a registration date of August 26, 2008
According to DomainTools.com, Telepathy has owned the domain name since October 22, 2001 which is the oldest record they have on file for the domain.
Although the domain name is parked there are no suggest terms on the page.
The Albir Hills Resort is located in Spain and seems to own and operate the SHA Wellness Spa which has its own site at shawellnessclinic.com
Here is some information from the site:
“”SHA is a wellness clinic dedicated to improving the health and welfare of people through the fusion of ancient oriental disciplines and revolutionary western techniques. The main areas of SHA: SHA method, which is based on a highly cleansing diet based on macrobiotic principles adapted to modern times, balanced to the needs of each person, combined with natural therapies, anti-aging medicine unit ( healthy-aging), capable of slowing the aging process and prevent disease by applying the most advanced techniques and aesthetic medicine unit, which will allow you to achieve excellent results both facial and body at the way less invasive as possible. All designed and supervised by world renowned experts including Michio Kushi-known figure, a world leader in modern macrobiotics.”"
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The CEO of Yahoo Scott Thompson resigned tonight according to a report in the Wall Steet Journal. He told the company that he has been diagnosed with thyroid cancer.
Ross Levinsohn was named as interim Chief Executive Officer.
Here is the press release:
“”Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) today announced that the Board of Directors has named Fred Amoroso as Chairman of the Board of Directors and Ross Levinsohn as interim Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. .
Mr. Amoroso replaces Roy Bostock, who has stepped down from his role as Non-Executive Chairman in order to accelerate the leadership transition for the new Board. Mr. Levinsohn replaces Scott Thompson, former Chief Executive Officer, who has left the Company.
Under the Board’s settlement agreement with Third Point, three Third Point nominees — Daniel S. Loeb, Harry J. Wilson, and Michael J. Wolf — will join the Yahoo! Board, effective May 16, 2012. Mr. Bostock, along with Patti Hart, VJ Joshi, Arthur Kern and Gary Wilson, all of whom previously disclosed their intentions not to stand for re-election, as well as Mr. Thompson, have decided to step down from the Board immediately.
As a part of the settlement agreement, Third Point, which owns an aggregate of 70,545,400 shares, or 5.8% of Yahoo! common stock, has agreed to withdraw its previous Board nominations for consideration at the annual meeting and vote its shares in support of Yahoo!’s nominees. Yahoo!’s slate of director nominees for election or re-election at the 2012 annual meeting of stockholders will now include Fred Amoroso, John Hayes, Peter Liguori, Thomas McInerney, Maynard Webb, Sue James, David Kenny, Brad Smith, Daniel S. Loeb, Harry J. Wilson and Michael J. Wolf.
As interim CEO, Mr. Levinsohn will manage the Company’s day-to-day operations with assistance from Yahoo!’s existing senior leadership team.
“The Board is pleased to announce these changes and the settlement with Third Point, and is confident that they will serve the best interests of our shareholders and further accelerate the substantial advances the Company has made operationally and organizationally since last August. The Board believes in the strength of the Company’s business and assets, and in the opportunities before us, and I am honored to work closely with my fellow directors and Ross to continue to drive Yahoo! forward,” said Fred Amoroso, Chairman of the Yahoo! Board of Directors.
Mr. Amoroso continued, “On behalf of the entire Board, I would also like to thank Patti, VJ, Arthur, Gary and, in particular, Roy, for their dedicated long-term service and contributions to the Board and Yahoo!.”
Third Point Chief Executive Officer Daniel S.…