The bill entitled: "Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act" sponsored by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) passed a US Senate panel this morning by a 19-0 vote. Such organizations such as Electronic Frontier Foundation eBay, Amazon.com, Bloomberg, Google and Wikipedia were against the bill and warned that the bill would give federal law enforcement too much power to police infringing … [Read more...]
Federal Court Awards Domain Holder Common Law Trademark Right & Orders Registrar To Return Domains
In what could be one of the most important legal decisions of the year for domain holders, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that a domainer hold acquired common-law trademark rights by simple ownership and usage in domain names he owned, even though they corresponded to well-known trademarked brand names. The ruling for domain holders is a result of a default … [Read more...]
You Think Facebook Is Bad? Walgreens Sues Over The Letter “W’
If you think Facebook.com has been overly aggressive in its defense of their trademark going against sites starting with the word "Face" or ending in the word "Book" you should see the lawsuit Walgreen's just filed over the letter "W" This week, Walgreens filed suit against Wegmans Food Markets Inc., a New York-based supermarket chain over the letter "W." According to the suit filed in … [Read more...]
Lesson From National A-1: If Your Operating Sites You Should Consider Separating Them
Although it still does not appear that any charges have been filed out of the Feds raid on National A-1 offices a couple of weeks ago, that event does take me back to the basics, back to the time I practiced law. When I used to practice law and a client with an existing business came into my office with a new idea for a new business, one of the first things I would tell them is to seriously … [Read more...]
This One Won’t Be Going To Court: Schilling’s NameAdmin Wins A UDRP On SleepSack.com
Yesterday we posted about a that Name Administration settled a case it filed after it lost a UDRP on the domain name ChilliBeans.com Today comes a UDRP decision that Frank's not going to have to appeal brought by Halo Innovations, Inc. on the domain name sleepsack.com. (SleepSack decision (word doc) There are some interesting cases cited by the opinion on other generic terms that had … [Read more...]
After Trademark Threat, LameBook.com Files Preemptive Suit Against FaceBook.com
TechCrunch this morning is reporting that a site called LameBook filed for a declaratory judgment in its home state of Texas against Facebook.com asking the court to find it is not infringing on Facebook's trademark. According to the story upon receiving communications from Facebook.com that it believed LameBook.com violated it trademark, instead of waiting for the federal lawsuit to come, … [Read more...]
Win The Battle But Lose The War: ChilliBeans.com UDRP Still Sticks As A Loser & That’s The Problem
I got the same message from Frank's Name Administration today that they settled a lawsuit stemming from the UDRP loss on the domain name ChilliBeans.com While like the other bloggers who wrote about this development, I'm happy to see that justice was done, that the winner of the UDRP settled with the domain holder, but the bigger picture is that the lawsuit and settlement does nothing to … [Read more...]