I received a cease and desist letter from well-known .com

Hey everybody,

Long time lurker and first time poster...

I received a C&D letter from a well known website after obtaining the .ME variant.

I planned on simply making it a forum not necessarily related to the .com equivalent.

This C&D letter letter is legit, and they seem to be pretty aggressive. They have the .info, the .mobi, the .ws and I'm sure a few others. They have been around since 1996 btw.

After buying the domain, I parked the domain at a parking company to gauge any traffic while I decide on how to go about making the site. I immediately moved the nameserver back to the default parked page at godaddy so that they don't believe that I'm somehow making thousands of dollars off of their name. (I haven't made a penny btw). I believe that is one of the primary reasons that they think I made the site in bad faith and plan on attempting to defame their good name.

What would be the best course of action? I do not want to make it into a huge deal, but I think that by me making a discussion forum, it won't infringe upon any of the copyright laws in question will it? I'd like some help as to how I should go about doing this since I have about a week to either give up the domain or they will pursue with legal actions and I don't have the funds for the courtroom.

I want the $40 reg fee back at least.


Thanks!

 

Yikes.. thats no fun.. Im sure they would be more then willing to give you back the registration fee if you were to ask. Who knows though.

 

I can't say for sure without knowing the domain but it is very likely you infringed on the owners trademark and are therefore cyber squatting their domain/trademark. It doesn't matter what you plan on doing with the domain, if you are still infringing on the trademark. My advice is to comply fully with all their requests and turn the domain back over to them, if you don't there is a good chance they will sue you and win the domain back and also cost you a ton of money in lawyers fees.

 

The question that you need to answer is:

Is your intended forum on the same topic as their website or in the same field? If so, you are going to lose.

Frankly, the most likely reason you would want to use their domain with .ME would be to capture some of their traffic or to benefit from their name.

Depending on the answer to the first question will determine your ability to use the name. I would guess it is the same topic and you have no right to use the name. Give it up and save yourself time and money. You have no right to even get your reg fee back, so if they offer that, take it and run.

As you mentioned, you have made no money thus far, so it hardly seems worth a fight even if you think you have a right to use the domain.

Hope that helps. There will be tons of people who post telling you to fight - they are most likely clueless about copyright law, trademark law, and the expense of litigation and your potential liability.

 

Do what they've told you to do. Cease and desist. Don't touch the domain name. Don't put a holding page on it, nothing. You can't possibly tell us that you didn't know when you bought it that it was a famous name. That's ostensibly why you bought it...

If they offer to buy it from you, sell it to them for whatever they offer (if they contact you, I'd even tell them that you just want your reg fees back). If they demand the name without payment though, it isn't worth you time and money to fight them. Give up the name and consider it a relatively cheap lesson in domain name / trademark law...

Sorry.

Deena Burgess, Esq.
________________________________________________________________________

Any opinions are offered without knowledge of the specific law of your jurisdiction and with only the limited information provided in your post. No advice given here should be reasonably relied upon by you or any third party without consulting an attorney who is aware of all of the facts and law surrounding your situation. Any advice given here is not intended to create an attorney-client relationship in any way.

 

Thanks to everybody who has responded so far.

Yes I did know that it was famous. However - the domain itself is a take on a compound word and can have multiple definitions. I'm bad with examples but here's one: "Myspace" is a brand name, but can literally mean something to the effect of "My three dimensional realm".

In that case, it answers the question of whether or not it would have invaded on their topic. The name of the company doesn't even make sense in relation to what service they provide and my take on the subject would have a bit different.

BTW, I hate copyright laws. This is why they have the registration period before the landrush. They should have no legal obligation over this unless they have previous applied for one particular TLD extension and somehow it got mixed up in the process. This would potentialy help alleviate a lot of problems... maybe. I don't know what I'm talking about.

 

If the mark in question is indeed famous, what do you suppose is the likelihood
users won't confuse your site with the mark holder's? And I wonder what that
parking page showed prior to your changing it.

It's fine to hate copyright laws, just as alleged drug dealers hate laws against
drug trafficking and potential speedsters hate anti-speeding laws. Then again,
trademark holders also hate possible cybersquatters from profiting off any of
their hard-earned work.

If you ever find yourself in the position of a trademark holder and if you catch
someone doing that to you, feel free to share here how it feels like.

 

I would normally say F*** them, but try and sell them the domain for IDK $100

 

Horrible advice.

Trying to sell the domain for a profit helps establish the OP's bad faith in registering the domain name.

 

well then I stick with my origional statement, F*** off. I suppose Im not you and I dont have the responsibility. I feel sorry for you anyway.

 

Feels good, doesn't it? Especially telling others to f* off while you sit all comfy
and safe staring at your computer, and telling others to do something which is
dangerously wrong while you won't pay the price for their choices?

Too bad no one else has any responsibility to do anything for you, yet will still
hold you responsible for your words. Feel sorry all you want, and people here
can also feel sorry for how irresponsible and childish you are.

If you can't take it, then don't dish it out.

 

Some wild ideas here..
First of all, if you have not offered them to buy the domain you are better off. Offering them this would be the worst you can do.
Second: Just because they have the trademark registered dont mean you are infirging on their rights. As amtter of fact, if you have a forum discussing their product or service you are more likely to get to keep the domain.
Third: Having the domain parked was pehaps not the best idea since you then use it in a comercial way, no matter if you made any money or not, it is only there wiht adds on it... so get the parking away asap.
Forth: DONT HAND OVER THE DOMAIN! It really should not be that easy for the big guys to grab domains. They will have to apply ICANN's UDRP and this will cost them anything from 3 000 USD to 20 000 USD depending on how much the lawyers will skimm them on. You just might get an offer from them instead, and if you do NEVER EVER say yes at once go for the "Well I was not thinking of selling since I really want all the customers to be able to come togheter and discuss all the great products that I love so much too, but maybe I should think of it and see if I could use another domain" type of answere.
Five: IF it goes to UDRP then it cost you nothing, answere the questions you get, and if you win you win (and then you will get a good offer from them..) and if you loose you loose, cost you nothing more then the domain, same as giving it up now..
Good Luck

 

For some people, though, money's no object as long as the principle is upheld.
I suppose one can nonetheless feel good they spend money for it, and they'll
also feel good at getting what they want.

Both are equal, I guess.

 

They can sue you in addition to UDRP. To think there is no downside to fighting the trademark owner is folly.

Sure they can use UDRP to get the name, they can also sue you in Federal Court. They are not limited to just one remedy. Pissing off a trademark holder because there is no cost in opposing a UDRP fight is not a good plan. Also, there is no reason to think they will use UDRP when they can just sue you and get the same thing accomplished but it will cost you thousands to defend.

 

What's the domain name BTW?

 

Whats the domain? I would like to buy it off you for $40 PM please.

 

I don't believe that the big guy's should be able to "steal" what YOU paid for. That's first things first. But I do believe in trademark/copyright laws. If you did myspace.me, I don't see how myspace.com could swoop in and steal it from you.

If you're promoting them I'd assume a judge would laugh them out of court. And if you do something COMPLETELY different from them, I'd also assume a judge would laugh them out of court.

My 2 cents? Don't give it to them without a fight. They can't sue you for damaging their name if you DONT. Just remove the cash parking and leave it blank for now and see what happens.