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View Full Version : Parking Page "ads" can constitute trademark infringement!


bwhhisc
14th October 2007, 11:43 AM
QUOTE: Here’s an interesting discussion of trademark infringement and parked pages… if you park e.g. igloo.com and the parking company does PPC and ads show for igloo coolers, can Igloo Coller company challenge the domain name rights via a UDRP and take it away?
Yes, they can. generic domain name, but used in an infringing way, with no real case for it being used for non-infringing use. Bummer. Happened to the registrant of unlv.com, which was taken away. END QUOTE

Above paragraph at very bottom of:
http://www.johnon.com/417/domainer-profits.html

jacksonm
14th October 2007, 12:02 PM
That's it, I'm removing all of my parked domains.

If you think about it, this could apply to minisites running adsense just as well.

This actually sounds like a grey area to me, but as we have seen wipo panels are extremely pro-plaintiff.

.

Rubber Duck
14th October 2007, 12:30 PM
That's a bit like not getting a job for fear of paying tax.

jacksonm
14th October 2007, 12:45 PM
That's a bit like not getting a job for fear of paying tax.

Not really, as with a job you are getting a steady and pre-defined income and the tax is only a percentage of that.

If I consider that the lowest I'd sell a domain to an end-user is 2000 EUR, and I make between 5-10 EUR a month from parking, then I'd be a damned fool to lose one of my prime domains just because it was parked and happened to show an advertisement for an abstract trademark.

.

bramiozo
14th October 2007, 01:24 PM
That's it, I'm removing all of my parked domains.

If you think about it, this could apply to minisites running adsense just as well.

This actually sounds like a grey area to me, but as we have seen wipo panels are extremely pro-plaintiff.

.

If you want to automatically generate parking pages using some sort of ad-feed you are limited to those feeds feeds which allow you to block specific ads, surely they exist. Google adsense allows you to block ads but you will have to do it manually, nevertheless you can enter them in bulk.

burnsinternet
14th October 2007, 01:32 PM
It also states:

This Big Picture story addresses our current perspectives, and how we base our “investment” decisions from our perspectives. Dr. Hartnett says your inner perspective is what you should follow, even though it is probably not well supported by those around you. In 1995 he looked at domains as real estate, and spent $5 million dollars building 5,860 websites in 1996. It was very difficult. People were negative, always trying to take away the dream. Don’t worry. Do what you know you should be doing.

Stuart Wood says development is 3 P’s : Plan, Passion, and patience. Enuff said.

bwhhisc
14th October 2007, 01:47 PM
That's it, I'm removing all of my parked domains.
If you think about it, this could apply to minisites running adsense just as well.
This actually sounds like a grey area to me, but as we have seen wipo panels are extremely pro-plaintiff. .

Part of a defense in a case of this sort may be the "keyword" that you use which would be recorded by the parking company.
If you own igloo.com and use "coolers" as your keyword then you may be asking for trouble. On the other hand if you use
"Eskimo's" or "Alaska" as keywords you may have a good chance that infringement was not your object in marketing.

If this becomes a broad issue it is going to incumbent on the parking companies to help sort out this end of things or many
people will indeed shy away or find other ways to monetize. Hopefully a few precedents will be set in domainers favors and
that will help clarify. Seems that there should be some kind of "warning" notice for generic dictionary terms (to allow domain
owners time to voluntarily fix ads, or remove offensive items) before it goes straight to UDRP.

bramiozo
14th October 2007, 02:14 PM
That being said and speaking of generics, if you can demonstrate that you had the intention to avoid infringement, by blocking ads or by choosing certain keywords, changes should be in your favor.

Also, a lot of UDRP's start with stating that the defendant is simply not responding, leaving the WIPO-panel with a single-sided view from the complainant, BE PROACTIVE in claiming your rights.

touchring
14th October 2007, 02:22 PM
That's it, I'm removing all of my parked domains.

If you think about it, this could apply to minisites running adsense just as well.

This actually sounds like a grey area to me, but as we have seen wipo panels are extremely pro-plaintiff.

.


I don't see how this will affect adnse because he msut use the keyword "igloo" instead of "igloo coolers", and that is a generic keyword not related to his trade of selling coolers. By using the keyword "igloo" he must expect that his ads appear on all websites related to the eskimo "igloo". This will be his own doing.

Charrua
14th October 2007, 02:29 PM
Here’s an interesting discussion of trademark infringement and parked pages… if you park e.g. igloo.com and the parking company does PPC and ads show for igloo coolers, can Igloo Coller company challenge the domain name rights via a UDRP and take it away? Yes, they can. generic domain name, but used in an infringing way, with no real case for it being used for non-infringing use. Bummer. Happened to the registrant of unlv.com, which was taken away.

Info from http://www.johnon.com/417/domainer-profits.html

That don't have any logic to me anyway is the end of parking companies and the end of domain name registration by domainers?

Which are the options?

Charrua.

sunsei21
14th October 2007, 02:43 PM
QUOTE: Here’s an interesting discussion of trademark infringement and parked pages… if you park e.g. igloo.com and the parking company does PPC and ads show for igloo coolers, can Igloo Coller company challenge the domain name rights via a UDRP and take it away?
Yes, they can. generic domain name, but used in an infringing way, with no real case for it being used for non-infringing use. Bummer. Happened to the registrant of unlv.com, which was taken away. END QUOTE

Above paragraph at very bottom of:
http://www.johnon.com/417/domainer-profits.html

i have heard that often over the years u might own igloo .com but u best put up a pic of some igloos and sell igloos lol :)

burnsinternet
14th October 2007, 02:44 PM
Selling ice cubes to Eskimos?

bwhhisc
14th October 2007, 02:55 PM
Selling ice cubes to Eskimos?
ROTFLMOL

burnsinternet
14th October 2007, 03:14 PM
Well, selling big blocks of ice as building material to those who would use it - that really IS selling ice cubes to Eskimos!

An Ice Hotel is no igloo. Aleutian Islanders are probably the only real target market.

Rubber Duck
14th October 2007, 03:16 PM
Sounds like we all agree with the WIPO panel.

jacksonm
14th October 2007, 03:29 PM
Sounds like we all agree with the WIPO panel.

Au contraire.

Igloo is part of eskimo culture and is a valuable term to them as such. Parking the domain while waiting for a purchaser would seem the logical approach in order to mitigate renewal costs.

How many people really even bother to enter keywords on their parked domains? I generally don't. Any given generic will have potentially hundreds of abstract trademarks today. A site like namedrive could serve ads from any one of the TM owners, even without a keyword set.

As I understood it, this eskimo.com was just an example and not a real case, but if wipo panels really go this far then almost no form of "lazy" monetization is safe anymore.

.

Rubber Duck
14th October 2007, 03:39 PM
So this was bought by an actual Igloo dweller?