If anyone that has used the services of a domain name lawyer recently would PM the law firm/individual, it would be much appreciated.
Weird, somebody 'hijacked' the thread to ask about the potential legal problems with MySpace domains, but by the time I had written my reply their message had already been removed (quick mods here!) but their message doesn't seem to have been moved to a separate thread, and hasn't been reposted anywhere... And since I wrote a long reply, I don't want it to go to waste So I've included my response below (If anyone does find the other thread, let me know and I'll move my response) : You could probably receive conflicting responses to the question of MySpace domains, since a LOT of people are using domains that include the word MYSPACE and haven't received any legal threats... YET! In the past, MySpace have definitely threatened legal action against owners of domains using the trademark MySpace, and I would say it's only a matter of time until they go to the next round of threats... They've probably just got their hands full right now with other things, eventually they'll get to the next round. And those people hoping to make a quick buck and then surrender the domain are not counting on the legal action including something like this : "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 the 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). And living in another country will not stop them from pursuing legal action. Worth the risk? I don't think so... You can still have a website focussed on MySpace users, just take steps to not infringe on their trademark - starting with a non-trademark infringing domain.
Hey thanks for the reply.... don't no what happen to my question! that's weird but this question been stopping me to make this site of mines. Its a very great idea and MYSPACE can bring the traffic to my site but I'm not sure if its worth the try to include MYSPACE in my domain name. But there are thousands of sites with MYSPACE in their domain name and is it possible for MYSPACE take legal action against all those sites? Thanks again for the fast reply and I hope this won't get deleted!
The most searched-for myspace-related keywords are : "myspace layouts" If you google "myspace layouts" the top 10 includes domains like : www.bigoo.ws www.freeweblayouts.net www.skize.com www.freecodesource.com www.mylayoutscreator.com None of them are trademark-infringing. So you can obviously have a successful myspace-targeted site without including the word myspace in the domain name. So then why would you knowingly create a domain that infringes the trademark of a company owned by one of the world's richest men - I'm sure his legal team is gigantic and has more than enough resources to take legal action against hundreds of people at any time... ps. sorry I contributed to the hijacking by replying. in future it's better to post a new thread.
PM Sent And an apology to CReed who is probably getting a lot of irrelevant 'thread subscription' emails
No apology needed - hehehe - Never subscribe But while I'm here - thanks for the info. I've seen the firm you PM'd me about mentioned a lot so I was wanting someone to confirm before we contacted them. Sent him an email so we'll wait and see what his response is.