If you register a dropped domain, do you have full rights to the domain? Or can the previous owner take legal action against you even if the domain name is not trademarked? Has anyone faced such a situation where you have to give up a domain without any compensation, even registration fees?
Ofcourse why not.. There are lot of domains getting dropped. Suppose you are thinking of a domain like "meethere.com " ( may be dropped) you dont know whether it was registered before, and then you register. So it all yours
Can the previous owner take legal action against you, since they may have spent time and money advertising the domain (non-trademarked)?
Then why did he not renewed.. Its his responsibility to renew it.. There are lot of domains getting dropped and registered by new user everyday.
I dont think they can take any legal actions as they didnt re-newed them and once you dont re-new then you dont own it .
They can only take legal action if it is trademarked. They have to take responsability and renew. I just registered www.medlineny.com and it was PR4 when I got it and I thought that was cool. The owner e-mailed me and I said I wouldn't settle for lower than High XX and he replied back saying he didn't want to pay that much so I didn't give it back.