It's nothing to do with copyright or patents, AOL is a trademark which is a completely different kettle of fish.
Balls man.. Put the domain on sale on some site other than DP .. Then when those clowns show up.... tell them u already sold it before u got the damn thing by fedex.. Keep changing hands on domain until Aol is tired
Uh, yeah ... what a really good idea -- Trademark lawyers haven't worked out how to Google for snippets and information relating to domain names or look on busy webmaster forums. Actually, Dreamchaser - what's the latest on this? Have you handed over the domain yet?
Hi mcfox, I am out of my city as I had to leave for a urgent work which is 600 km away, right now I am posting a reply via Digital Point from there. Have to get back and provide you situation and my answer over this, I am still confused though. Cheers, Dreamchaser
You mean this? I was sarcastically referring to the fact that legal teams actively scour the internet using Google and reading through busy webmaster forums in order to turn up or elicit via PM or email; information they can use when it comes to proving their case, or in this instance, proving you received the fedex package and that you only registered the domain when AOL launched their AOLUncut service. I would also be surprised if they didn't have your blog entries on file somewhere too.
You'd actually have a better case if your site had at least something to do with AOL. As it is, it looks like you were just trying to profit off the name. You can have AOLSucks.com without any problem as long as the site is about why AOL sucks. If you put a registered trademark in your domain name you have to ask yourself "what does my site have to do with their company?" If the answer is "nothing" then you've got no legal footing for having it.
Do not give it up.. Sounds like a scam to me.. They said that there is a trademark of AOL not AOLA or AOLBB just AOL.. So your not doing any harm.. Send them a bill for your time, and another bill to buy the domain for half million dollars or stock options. I'll give you a few examples. The word buy. We got best best buy, buy.com.. Just search the internet. What about the word auto?
mrtsays: 'buy' is a generic word and therefore cannot be trademarked, AOL on the other hand isn't. If you think buy.com or the word auto are good examples of why AOL doesn't have a case then you clearly don't understand trademark law.
Yea you have a good point. But don't you think there is some way to flip flop it around? like the word Google has go in it. Or companys with the same 3 letters in it that are in the same order..
what about gaol ? It has Aol in it. How would this work though ING - thats the name of my company i am going to trademark it. So anyone who puts ING at the end or in the begining is going to have to remove it. I really don't see a problem with aoluncut.. say it as one word? I want the honest truth tell me what you think... Also don't say anything about my bad english i already know about it.
Oh, for crying out loud! Why don't you go back to the beginning of this thread and read every post very carefully, making certain to visit the various links on the way. Then you will have the answer to all of your questions.
lol.. take my advice.. sell it " on paper " to ur friend .... keep transfering domain name owner.. AOL wil hav a hard time sending lawsuit to all ur relatives and friends
your best bet is probably giving it up. They have more money to fight the battle than you do...I'm sure
So many people giving advice. Most of it completely uninformed advice from people with absolutely no knowledge of similar past cases and no knowledge of domain disputes. When it comes to trademark infringement, you can really only depend on professional advice from a lawyer specializing in domains... Personally, I would feel extremely lucky if I got the $25, because that's a lot better than other possible outcomes... As I wrote in another message here earlier today, apart from losing the domain you could also be sued for : "An award of compensatory, consequential, statutory, and punitive damages to Plaintiff in an amount to be determined at trial." In other words, you might not just have to hand over any cash you made, you may need to pay for the damages that you've caused to them (Intentional Interference with Prospective Economic Advantage - Deceptive Trade Practices - Unfair Competition), not to mention you will be paying their own legal costs (which you can guess will be very large). So it's not a matter of whether or not you lose the domain, it's a matter of whether or not the court case forces you into selling everything you own, and makes you bankrupt and living on the streets begging for scraps of food and dreaming of the good old days when you had access to the internet and DP...
dont give them your domains because its not necessry to give...u r not harming any of there service...