What is a celebrity's name worth?

I have purchased CarolinePal(.com)

This is the girlfriend of international superstar Micheal Phelps.
Any idea what I could get for this name?

Regards

 

no one know her

 

Not sure. You have to be lucky to attract people to this domain name. Just pray that phelps and caroline make a lot of stories together in regular interval.

 

ask her what it's worth. Maybe her attorney's and her can come up with a price.


lol

Why do people squat? A client of mine had to just go after a squatter and won their case fairly quickly.

 

"Any person who registers a domain name that consists of the name of another living person, or a name substantially and confusingly similar thereto, without that person's consent, with the specific intent to profit from such name by selling the domain name for financial gain to that person or any third party, shall be liable in a civil action by such person."

http://www.bitlaw.com/source/15usc/1129.html

 

So, every domain name should pass US trademark act? Even it is owned by some non us resident?

 

And this sticks in courts very well.

 

In other words, you can own it and do something with it, as long as it's not making a single penny.

 

It all depends on how the judge sees it. You can't hold domains for ransom or hostage either. But it all comes down to how much you sell it for vs how much of a prick the person who rightfully should have it is going to be.

If you do nothing with the domain name to make money from it, but advertise it is for sale, and keep your selling price less than court costs, then you are still an ass hole, but can manage to stay out of trouble this way.

 

Okay, thanks for being so polite about it. It's just a name, if the site is developed without any content related to her it can be monetized. Am I right? After all, it's just a name. I mean if I name my daughter Caroline Pal, is that TM infringement.

 

Yes very true the name doesn't have to be related to a celeb. You should not post anything about the celeb the domain name is about. Post content that is not related to the famous persons name.

 

No I think a lot of these people are wrong. You can put up a site about her (and Michael), you can't just buy it and try to sell it to her for a profit (like @mjewel said). Develop it, then if she says anything (which I highly doubt she will), take it down or give her the domain.

 

I think I will register your personal name and do what I want with it. That way I can make money off from you and maybe write some content about your life and your daughter named Caroline Pal Allen so that the world knows all about you and your family. Of course, I will also have ads on the site to make a profit while people are there. If you don't like it, you will have to pay me X amount of dollars or else you can read an article on my website about you, about how cheap you are. Then I could also start a forum on there so that others can participate in the conversations and let people say whatever they want. All about you.

That's okay, right?

Oh and btw, don't worry about already owning the .com or the .net, because I an SEO company, I'll out position your own site with the .org. www.JesseAllen.org and then I'll go after your most searched key phrases to ensure that web searches end up at my site, all about you.

I hope I made some kind of a point here. I would never actually do that, because I have ethics and integrity, but it just peeves me when people do this. Like I already mentioned, I recently wittnesses one of my clients take an individual to court for this exact same thing, and won their case very easily. It was a shame, however, that it could not be resolved outside of court in a reasonable manner.

 

You made your point

 

Yes, I believe there would be some trademark issues with that domain. However, since no one knows her, I don't believe anyone would go to the extent of suing you. Since no one knows her though, selling the domain would pretty much be non-existent as well.