Lets say a corporation is called "fruit stores INC." Now they have an eccommerce store called bunchofapples.com Is it legal for me to open up a store and sell the exact same things and call it bunch-of-apples.com Do they have legal right to the name "bunchofapples"?
If they don't have a trademark on the domain name, and it is a common usage of words, then you would have no problems. Of course, it is hard to tell with your made up examples how close or infringing the name might be. Without the actual words and sites in question, any advice you get is going to be pretty worthless.... although most advice on DP legal issues is pretty worthless anyway.
Ain't that the truth. If someone is using a term or terms in commerce, it might not be wise to use a similar one in a similar capacity.
I would agree with this.. even if it's not common usages of words.. domain names themselves are not protected all that strictly by any inforcement agency.. how many domains exist with the term "adsense" or "nike" in them. If they were able to forcefully remove these users from registerring all domains that included their name in it, I'm sure these corporate giants would move forward to do so. There are many cases they have tried, and failed, especially in the international arena. So I'm sure this little bunch of apples company would have little to no clout to actually stop you from using the domain. It would probably take them 10 years to figure out you are using it anyway.
It would make sense in my opinion to just create your own name rather than spawn confusion by using something similar. Would it cause you legal problems? Who knows. It doesn't have to be legally problematic to get sued. They can take you to court and cost you quite a bit of cash even if you are wrong- it's not really worth it IMO.
I think the bigger question is: why don't you just use a different name? I mean a retard 4-year-old could think up at least one other name. I'm sure you (or whomever) could too. Either way, consult a real lawyer.
First usage establishes rights. Adding hyphens does not get around trademark infringement. This would be a clear case of trademark infringement. Use another name if you want to avoid legal problems.
The problem is that the trademark is already established by actively using and conducting business through that domain.
While they are just English words it is clear that such a name in connection with a supermarket can be unique and ideal as indicating a place of origin. What's wrong with bunchoforanges? If you're deliberately using that name to trade off that company's traffic then do the math.
Interlectual property rights law is exceptionally complicated, especially on the net where you have international considerations. Irrespective of trademarks with these kinds of things you also need to look at intentions. Are you attempting passing off - ie making people think you are one and the same company and therefore you gain sales at their expense. General considerations are geographic area for customer base, type of trade etc. If one company sold apple trees in Hong Kong and the other is a USA based supermarket there is unlikely to be an issue on passing off but if both are UK based green grocers then almost certainly there will be an issue for one of the companies. With my previous employers we had a team of people that did nothing but pursue people that had registered domains that either infringed our trademarks, had common miss spellings, were punctuated versions etc. Most simply had to had over the domain to us, those that fought got legal costs added to the case.