Hi, A quick question: is it legal to register a domain of a product that exists with a potential to sell this domain to the company later? Especially something like a movie sequel or a video game sequel, with the number 2, 3 or 4 attached to the title of it.
No that is not legal. It is called cybersquatting. If your purpose in registering a domain is just to sell it back to the party who already owns the rights to the domain name - don't waste your time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybersquatting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anticybersquatting_Consumer_Protection_Act
Thanks for the links, that's helpful information. It seems a little tricky though. It's not saying that you can't register a domain name with the trademark in it; what you cannot do, is try to sell it to an owner of the trademark. So I assume that if one would register a domain, and just use it for his own needs, no law is being broken? (that's according to what's being stated on Wikipedia) Also, it looks like it only applies to US. Canada and Australia has similar laws too. I'm yet to find other countries, but I see that Russia doesn't mind this practice at all. I'm not based in US, but does it depend on where a registrar is based, or where is the company that registered a domain for them is based?
You are always free to buy any domain name, even a trademarked term. As far as using it, you can use a trademarked term so long as your intended use is not infringing on the trademark owners rights. The legalities of any action depend on where you are and where the various other parties are.
I see. Thanks for clarifying that. I believe monetizing a good trademarked domain due to company's poor marketing job wouldn't be such a bad idea.
I respectfully disagree. It sounds like you want to do the very thing you are not supposed to do. The problem is that if you build something out of it and you are successful the company can usually get the domain from you with minimal effort. So you invest your time and money and those efforts can just be taken from you with no real compensation.
I thought the law applies only to bad intentions for buying a domain. If my intentions are writing a wall of text on my website that is irrelevant to the actual company, and placing some ads, how would that break the law? Based on the information provided on Wikipedia, that's not what is considered to be bad intentions. But then again, I'm not aware of the actual policy. If, for example, I have an idea for a small website that has a similar title that the trademarked video game or a film has, and I build my site around it -- I don't believe there's any right for them to take it away from me. Is there?
After reading your previous posts it is hard to take your latest post at face value. But assuming you were to make a website with nothing to do with the trademarked term used in your domain name, then why have it in the domain name? The obvious reason is to trade on the marks good will. If you don't intend to do that then there is really no reason to pick that for the domain name. Could you get away with it and make some money - sure. People do all the time. Could the company come and take it from you - sure. Happens to people all the time. For me, I'd rather just pick a name I know I could keep and then build the site. You can obviously write or talk about a game or movie and the money you think you can make could still be made - except when using their trademark in your domain name.
If you want to monetize these kinds of domains, keep it secret in yourself about your idea to monetize it. Develop a wholetogether different theme website & run it, when the actual needer of this domain will ping you, You can tell you do not want to sell it, but he needs to buy it so he will offer substantial amount which you can negotiate & sell it if u want to.
I also don't see why this would be illegal, which doesn't make much sense. This practice is done in many types of business -- first come, first served. If they wanted the domain, they should have taken care of it.
Well, there are lots of domain name marketers why are registering thousands of domains and selling at higher prices.. Only one thing you have to avoid that is trade mark domain name.