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News Technology

New T-Mobile Android phone called ‘Prism’ getting ready to be released?

T-Mobile shop

T-Mobile USA appears to be working on a new smartphone called ‘Prism’, according to several new domain registrations this week that include names like tmobileprism.com and t-mobileprism.com.

Though a new device is only speculation, the company’s IP counsel registered the domain names through the internet brand protection company MarkMonitor, on November 21, 2011, but as of yet, hasn’t officially announced any plans for the device.

T-Mobile USA originally filed for the Prism trademark back in 2009 and has had three extensions granted since that time.  In 2009, Prism was one of many names being considering for its second Android phone, which was eventually marketed as the T-Mobile myTouch 3G in the United States.

The goods and services in the 2009 filing cover, “wireless handheld telecommunications devices, namely, wireless telecommunications devices that combine wireless voice and data telecommunications functions, digital imaging functions, computing functions, permit the two-way wireless transmission of e-mail and text, permit wireless access to a global computer network, gaming and multimedia functionality.” 

The list of new domain registrations include:

t-mobileprism.com
t-mobileprism.net
t-mobileprism.biz
t-mobileprism.org
t-mobileprism.us
tmobileprism.biz
tmobileprism.org
tmobileprism.us

Here’s a look at the WHOIS record for tmobileprism.com.

Registrant:
        IP Counsel
        T-Mobile USA, Inc.
        12920 SE 38th Street
         Bellevue WA 98006
        US

    Domain Name: tmobileprism.com

        Registrar Name: Markmonitor.com
        Registrar Whois: whois.markmonitor.com

    Administrative Contact:
        IP Counsel
        T-Mobile USA, Inc.
        12920 SE 38th Street
         Bellevue WA 98006
        US

    Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
        IP Counsel
        T-Mobile USA, Inc.
        12920 SE 38th Street
         Bellevue WA 98006
        US

    Created on…………..: 2011-11-21.
    Expires on…………..: 2013-11-21.
    Record last updated on..: 2011-11-21.

Discussion: TmoNews

Categories
Disputes National Arbitration Forum News Video Games

Epic Games fights for ownership of InfinityBlade.com domain name

Infinity Blade

Gears of War 3 developer Epic Games has apparently filed a complaint (Case Number: 1415318) over the domain name InfinityBlade.com with the National Arbitration Forum.

In December 2010, Epic released the iOS game Infinity Blade, which became the fastest-grossing app in iOS history, selling $1.6 million in just four days time.  A sequel to the game, Infinity Blade II, is set to launch on December 1, 2011.

Though Epic has clearly seen massive success with Infinity Blade, the domain name InfinityBlade.com was first registered in 2007, nearly three years before the game’s launch.  The game developer uses the web address http://epicgames.com/infinityblade/ as the official home page.

But registering the domain long before a product is launched, doesn’t always mean a win for the current owner.  

The forum panel examines three elements before reaching a decision: (1) is the domain name identical or confusingly similar to a trademark in which the complainant has rights (2) the owner has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name and (3) the domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith. 

If all three elements are satisfied, then the domain name will be ordered transferred. 

Up until last week, the owner of the domain was hidden behind Whois privacy protection services at Enom.  Now with the domain dispute filed, the Whois privacy has been removed on InfinityBlade.com revealing the owner to the public — something Enom does when a domain is alleged to violate or infringe a third party’s trademark, trade name, copyright interests or other legal rights.

The complainant won’t be officially known until a decision is published, but it’s safe to say the dispute was filed by Epic Games, who also has six separate trademarks filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office that cover a wide range of goods and services.

Today, when you visit InfinityBlade.com, a message on the website says the account has been suspended.

I’ve reached out to the current owner to see if I can learn more about the dispute, and will update this post if I hear back.

Categories
Movies News

Is the Dreamworks Animation film ‘Rise of the Guardians’ getting a new title?

Rise of the Guardians: Jack Frost

It appears DreamWorks Animation’s Rise of the Guardians set to release in November 2012 may be getting a new name – one that more highlights the film’s lead character ‘Jack Frost’ played by Chris Pine.

Formerly titled The Guardians of Childhood, then changed to Rise of the Guardians, in the past week DreamWorks Animation has registered well over a dozen domain names that hint at the name change like dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jackfrost.com, jackfrost.info, riseoftheguardians-jack.com and many more.

Here’s a look at several of the domain names acquired this week by DreamWorks Animation:

dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jack.biz
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jack.com
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jack.info
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jack.net
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jackfrost.biz
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jackfrost.com
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jackfrost.info
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jackfrost.net
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jack.org
dreamworksriseoftheguardians-jackfrost.org
jackfrost.info
riseoftheguardians-jack.biz
riseoftheguardians-jack.com
riseoftheguardians-jack.info
riseoftheguardians-jack.net
riseoftheguardians-jackfrost.biz
riseoftheguardians-jackfrost.com
riseoftheguardians-jackfrost.info
riseoftheguardians-jackfrost.net
riseoftheguardians-jack.org
riseoftheguardians-jackfrost.org

According to the press release issued last January by DreamWorks, the epic 3D adventure will also star Alec Baldwin as North (Santa Claus), Hugh Jackman as Bunnymund (Easter Bunny), Isla Fisher as Tooth (Tooth Fairy) and Jude Law as Pitch (The Boogeyman).

[Updated on November 22, 2011 at 4:35am EST:  Looks like the domain names have nothing to do with the film title. DreamWorks Animation registered several more names with characters from the film in the domain like riseoftheguardians-sandman.biz, riseoftheguardians-bunnymund.biz, and riseoftheguardians-north.org]

(Photo of Jack Frost via Rise of the Guardians official Facebook page)

Categories
News

Why? Google registers GoogleGoro.com

Google Goro

Update 1 at 6:42am EST:  Google Goro appears to be a web application that uses the Google App Engine.  According to Google, there a number of URLs like, ‘https://wow.goro.appspot.com/worldwondersproject/cuenca/index.html, however when you try signing into Google Goro using Google Accounts an error page appears.  You might also notice the subdirectory in the URL contains ‘worldwondersproject’.  In late October I wrote about Google acquiring the domains Worldwondersproject.com.   At the time of this update, neither WorldWondersProject.com nor GoogleGoro.com resolve to a web page.  There are plenty of other goro.appspot addresses that include different subdomains and subdirectories.

***

Google’s domain portfolio took a strange turn this week as the search engine giant registered GoogleGoro.com, GoogleGoro.net, and GoogleGoro.org.

Trying to figure out what Google plans to do with Goro (the name of which was used by the four-armed half-human, half-dragon sub-boss in the Mortal Kombat franchise) has proved to be difficult.

Google registered all three names on November 18th, through the internet brand protection company MarkMonitor.  However at the time of this story, none of the new domains resolve to a web page.

GoogleGoro may end up being nothing more than part of the company’s defensive domain strategy like Googlepoo.com, one of the company’s stranger names that it apparently has no plans for.  

It’s likely Google has plans for GoogleGoro as it took the .net and .org in addition to the .com. 

Here’s a look at the WHOIS record for GoogleGoro.com:

Registrant:
        DNS Admin
        Google Inc.
        1600 Amphitheatre Parkway 
         Mountain View CA 94043
        US

    Domain Name: googlegoro.com

        Registrar Name: Markmonitor.com
        Registrar Whois: whois.markmonitor.com
        Registrar Homepage: http://www.markmonitor.com

    Administrative Contact:
        DNS Admin
        Google Inc.
        1600 Amphitheatre Parkway 
         Mountain View CA 94043
        US

    Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
        DNS Admin
        Google Inc.
        1600 Amphitheatre Parkway 
         Mountain View CA 94043
        US

    Created on…………..: 2011-11-18.
    Expires on…………..: 2013-11-18.
    Record last updated on..: 2011-11-18.

Discussion: Search Engine Land

Categories
News Trademarks Video Games

EA files more trademarks this week, this time for ‘Secret Island’ video game

Electronic Arts: Secret Island

Video game publisher Electronic Arts has filed a second set of trademarks on November 15th, 2011, for Secret Island, but has made no announcement as to details of the video game.

The Secret Island trademark filings follow earlier applications this week for Blacked Out, which I reported about earlier today.

The trademark applications (Serial Number: 85473042 and Serial Number: 85473035) cover the typical goods and services that precede the launch of a game, like entertainment services, on-line computer games, and downloadable computer game software.

(Photo of Lisianski Island, Hawaiian Chain via Captain Pat Palazzolo)