Category: Disputes

With SocialEngine.net earning $1,000,000 per year, company goes after .com at WIPO

Post author By J.B.
Post date January 17, 2011

After meeting as high school students in 2002, Alex Benzer and Charlotte Genevier, co-founders of Webligo developed and launched Social Engine in 2007. The product is described as a social-network-in-a-box, a white label social networking application that is growing and now earns nearly $1MM/year according to the Webligo home page.

With dorm room offices and virtually zero operating costs, Webligo’s savings grew quickly. In 2006, Alex and Charlotte began developing a new product – SocialEngine – seeded with their sales and the recent acquisitions of two earlier projects (BlogHoster and IMS Pro). SocialEngine, 100% bootstrapped without any outside investment, was launched in 2007 with great reception. With SocialEngine now earning nearly $1M/year, Alex and Char have built a team of seven developers and designers to grow SocialEngine and explore other opportunities.

The only problem is, Webligo’s founders launched the product using the .net (socialengine.net), instead of the .com.

Now Webligo wants the .com, so the company has filed a WIPO complaint over the domain name SocialEngine.com.

While it’s not known whether Webligo made a previous offer on the .com domain, the company recently filed for a trademark on “Social Engine” in Sept. 2010, three years after launching their product, and nearly 11 years after the domain name socialengine.com was first registered.

The current registrant according to GoDaddy Whois is listed as “Domains for Sale” out of Columbus, OH, with an email address of DomainsForSale -at- Gmail.com.

Here’s a little more information about Social Engine, in a video pitch posted on TechCrunch back in 2008.

Tags Domain Cases, featured, social engine, socialengine.com, socialengine.net, Startup Incubator, Webligo, wipo, WIPO Complaint, World Intellectual Property Organization

News WIPO

Research In Motion files complaint with WIPO over BlackberryTablet.com

Post author By J.B.
Post date January 15, 2011
3 Comments on Research In Motion files complaint with WIPO over BlackberryTablet.com

Research In Motion (RIM) filed a complaint this week with WIPO over BlackberryTablet.com, ahead of the company’s launch of its own tablet in early 2011.

Although Research In Motion has named its tablet, Playbook, the company is going after the owner of BlackberryTablet.com who first registered the domain name nearly 1 year ago on January 24, 2010.

Ever since Apple introduced the iPad, tablets have been in demand, but this is the first such case filed with WIPO over a tablet domain name, but it likely won’t be the last. According to the reports from CES 2011, over 80 tablet launches will be taking place in 2011.

Research In Motion isn’t the only company missing its name

A quick glance at some of the bigger names launching tablets, shows that Research In Motion isn’t the only company who doesn’t own their name + tablet. Only a handful of companies appear to have registered their name in time. Not even the mighty Apple which leads the tablet market with its iPad owns Appletablet.com. The domain name was first registered back in 2006 and serves as an online resource guide for Apple products. Apple doesn’t own iPad.com either.

Motorola which is launching the Xoom in the first quarter of 2011 doesn’t own MotorolaTablet.com. The owner has the name up for sale.

Toshiba missed registering its domain name. Toshibatablet.com was registered in February 2010 to an Adam Feber who currently has the domain parked at GoDaddy.

Dell, so far, might be the only exception in the lot. The company does own Delltablet.com and it redirects the domain to its homepage on Dell.com. The company which launched its own tablet called “Streak” in 2010, also owns DellStreak.com. And if Dell pays attention to the domain aftermarket, it has a chance of getting the generic domain streak.com, which has been put up for sale with a reserve price range of 10,000 – 24,999 EUR in the upcoming GreatDomains auction starting January 20th.

Samsungtablet.com, Panasonictablet.com – neither name is owned by the company and you’ll be hard pressed to find very many manufacturers that own their company name + tablet.

Research In Motion and WIPO

Research In Motion has filed dozens of complaints over the years with WIPO over domain names and it has had success in having a large portion of the names transferred. Cases the company have won include RIM.com, researchinmotion.com, blackberryworld.com, blackberryguru.com, and dozens of other cases.

Currently, Research In Motion has other cases active with WIPO where a decision has not been made, including blackberrybing.com and blackberrybridge.com.

As the tablet market heats up, companies will be suiting up to duke it out with owners of domain names.

But there’s one domain owner who won’t have to worry about a battle – he’ll just have to worry whether to turn down huge offers or to develop the domain name into the top online tablet destination – Aron Meystedt of XF Investments who owns Tablets.com. As I first reported in the beginning of November 2010, Aron who also owns the first .com domain ever registered (symbolics.com), acquired Tablets.com for an undisclosed amount.

If you’re actually curious about the Blackberry Playbook which is expected to be forthcoming in Q1 of 2011, here’s a preview of its features.

Tags Apple tablet, Blackberry, Blackberry Playbook, Blackberry Tablet, BlackberryTablet.com, CES 2011, Dell Tablet, ipad, Motorola Tablet, Panasonic Tablet, Playbook, Research In Motion, Toshiba Tablet, udrp, wipo, WIPO Complaint

News Trademarks WIPO

Twitter files UDRP complaint against owner of domain: TwitterSearch.com

Post author By J.B.
Post date December 5, 2010
7 Comments on Twitter files UDRP complaint against owner of domain: TwitterSearch.com

TechCrunch is reporting that Twitter is going after the domain name Twittersearch.com, that was registered by its owner in March 2007. Twitter launched its popular micro-blogging service a year before, in March 2006.

Twitter late last week filed a UDRP complaint, notably its first ever since the company was founded, in an effort to obtain ownership over the (currently parked) domain name twittersearch.com – as you can see here.

Obviously, Twitter is right to do this, since the domain is likely to cause some confusion, although we should note Twitter hasn’t managed to secure a trademark for the term ‘twitter’ in the United States so far, despite multiple attempts.

A compliance review is currently pending according to the World Internataionl Property Organization (better known as WIPO). In the same list of cases over at WIPO, Pocket Kings the company that owns Full Tilt Poker is going after typo domain names.

A look at a rough traffic estimate provided by Compete, shows TwitterSearch.com receives several thousand visitors per month.

To avoid a trademark issue, other sites like TwitterCounter.com, a site which receives over 1 million visitors per month and provides stats, graphs and widgets for Twitter users, licenses the Twitter name from Twitter, Inc. Probably a smart move short term, but long term it might be in the company’s interest to re-brand. The company also owns Twittermail.com.

Oddly enough, Twitter Inc hasn’t gone after the owner of Twiter.com (a popular typo of Twitter), who is obviously trying to trick unsuspecting visitors into clicking on ads, but as TechCrunch points out: ” Twitter hasn’t managed to secure a trademark for the term ‘twitter’ in the United States so far, despite multiple attempts.” So winning a case for Twiter, might be a lot harder than winning a case for TwitterSearch.com.

Tags techcrunch, twitter, twitter search, twittersearch.com, udrp, wipo

Disputes News Trademarks Video Games

Activision knows a thing or two about ‘Call of Duty’ domain names (or do they?)

Post author By J.B.
Post date November 26, 2010
2 Comments on Activision knows a thing or two about ‘Call of Duty’ domain names (or do they?)

You might remember when news broke that Activision had registered a number of domains such as callofdutyfuturewarfare.com and codfuturewarfare.com. The website superannuation had announced a fresh new batch of names registered by Activision shortly after the company purchased the names in May.

Mary Tuck, one of the company’s attorneys, is not only responsible for registering the names, but she also files trademarks on behalf of the company according to the United States Patent and Trademark Office web site at uspto.gov. The same day the company registered the names on May 11, it also filed for the trademarks.

The superannuation article linked to the Whois records on the popular domain company site – DomainTools and it sparked a flurry of stories across gaming and technology sites.

Out of those dozen or so names though, nothing yet has been developed. In fact, none of the names resolve to any kind of website at the time of this story.

While rumors swirl about Activision’s next Call of Duty game, the company seems to be improving its understanding of domain names.

Call of Duty Domains

Call of Duty Black Ops, its latest title released earlier this month, is being considered a game-changer with sales shattering records all over the world. Activision does own callofdutyblackops.com, but it failed to register other variations.

If you notice the domains registered in May, the company picked up a number of variations of possible titles. For example, instead of just registering futurewarfare2.com – the company also registered codfuturewarfare2.com and callofdutyfuturewarfare2.com for a possible Call of Duty Future Warfare game.

No surprise, futurewarfare.com had been registered for years before, so Activision didn’t get its hands on the simplest version of the name. The name is owned by BuyDomains. And if shorter and memorable names are any indicator of value, Activision should probably buy the name now while its listed for a reasonable price of $3,788 (before someone else does).

Blackops.com, another name it doesn’t own, has seen a huge spike in traffic to its web site over the last several months, which is likely to grow with the game’s popularity.

Trademark infringing domains

When it came to registering domain names for its most successful title to date, Activision missed registering names like codblackops.com – a habit it’s now getting into by registering domain names with ‘cod’ (as in, Call of Duty) in the front.

With codblackops.com, the owner Stephen Girvan currently has a web site online that has seen a surge in traffic.

Visit the site, and click on the home page, and you’ll be taken to an article entitled: ‘Video Game Giants are Bullying Me’.

The article discusses Stephen’s dispute with Activision over domain names, which started after: ‘he created a “clan” website in January to allow him and his friends to post scores online of their favourite game, Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. At the beginning of March, Stephen, of Maryhill, says he renamed the website to codblackops.com after asking members to come up with a name.’

At this point what comes of the dispute isn’t known, but one thing is for sure: Activision is starting to get better at registering domain names.

My only advice is that the company should purchase FutureWarfare.com while it can.

The phrase ‘Future Warfare’ is generic, and used among military and military scholars. But that hasn’t stopped Activision from filing for a trademark – which it did on May 11, 2010 (along with Call of Duty Futurewarfare).

Tags activision, call of duty black ops, call of duty future warfare, stephen girvan, uspto

News WIPO

Dutch Boyd, Domainer and WSOP Winner, must have made a KILLING selling PokerHost.net to PokerHost.com after he won WIPO

Post author By J.B.
Post date November 29, 2009

Last year when PokerHost.com filed a UDRP complaint for the domain name PokerHost.net which was registered by WSOP Bracelet Winner and Domainer Dutch Boyd – they lost. Not only did they lose the case, but Dutch Boyd who owns thousands of domain names himself, won a reverse domain hijacking charge.

Andrew Allemann from Domain Name Wire has details about the actual case and the reverse domain hijacking charge which dates back to November/December 2008.

Dutch Boyd posted the story of his battle with Poker Host Inc on DutchBoyd.com and PokerHost.net. He even started a gripe site on the domain. While he posted updates on the battle with Poker Host on PokerHost.net, he claimed that if Poker Host Inc had just made him a reasonable offer on the domain before threatening him at a Casino and with the UDRP that he would’ve sold the name.

That was then, this is now

After Dutch Boyd won WIPO and slamdunked it with a reverse domain hijacking charge – the price of PokerHost.net shot up, leaving no doubt that if the name was ever sold to Poker Host Inc that Dutch would make a killing
PokerHost.com now owns PokerHost.net

There’s no doubt that PokerHost Inc now owns PokerHost.net. It looks like the name changed hands in the Spring (5/15/2009) – about five months after the WIPO decision in favor of Dutch Boyd. While we can’t seem to find any news of the transaction, Poker Host Inc now runs a FREE version of their .com online poker site on the .net extension.

The Company pissed off Dutch Boyd pretty good.

Although you can’t read the archives that were originally posted on PokerHost.net – you can still scour DutchBoyd.com for stories. Here’s a link to his first posts on the issue.

Why do Online Poker Rooms need the .NET?

If you’re a fan of Poker, you’ve probably noticed players on TV wearing t-shirts and hats stamped with the .net of the Online Poker Room. In the US, it is illegal to advertise gambling on TV, but if you can create a FREE (non-Cash version) sister site on the .net extension for example, then you can advertise. Most online Poker Rooms follow this model using the DotNet extension. Leaving their .com for cash players, but drawing in more traffic through advertising channels with their FREE .net version.