Category: Video Games

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News Video Games

Will Zynga release “Farmville Express”? Company registers farmvilleexpress.com, expressfarmville.com domain names

Farmville Express

Social gaming giant Zynga has registered the domain names farmvilleexpress.com and expressfarmville.com through MarkMonitor, its registrar of choice.  Both domains were registered earlier this week on April 20 following a story that appeared on Farmville Freak that discussed a survey sent out by Zynga from Facebook asking users about mobile farming.

Games.com followed up the story also hinting that the gaming giant had a new, lighter version of FarmVille mobile in the works.

What are the possibilities for the domain names?

Last May, Zynga announced a partnership with American Express  that now allows American Express customers to use their Membership Rewards points to redeem Zynga’s virtual goods and game cards.  Though the website is not that easy to find, the Membership Rewards Program from American Express extends beyond Farmville and includes virtual goods from other Zynga games like YoVille, Frontierville, Cityville, and others.  

So it’s definitely looking promising that a new, lighter version of Farmville called “Farmville Express” will be released.    

At the time of this story, farmvilleexpress.com is parked at GoDaddy (where the name now resides under a zynga.com e-mail address), while the web address expressfarmville.com currently doesn’t resolve. 

Domain Name: farmvillexpress.com

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

    Administrative Contact:
        Domain Administrator
        DNStination Inc.
        303 Second Street Suite 800N
         San Francisco CA 94107
        US
         +1.4155319335 Fax: +1.4155319335

    Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
        Domain Administrator
        DNStination Inc.
        303 Second Street Suite 800N
         San Francisco CA 94107
        US
         +1.4155319335 Fax: +1.4155319335

    Created on…………..: 2011-04-20.
    Expires on…………..: 2012-04-20.
    Record last updated on..: 2011-04-20.

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Disputes News Trademarks Video Games

Zynga trademark application for the term ‘patentville’ prompts owner of domain name to launch website

Patentville

Zynga’s recent European trademark application for the term ‘patentville’ appears to have prompted the owner of the domain patentville.com to take notice.  On April 14, a day after my story ran on Domaining.com, the popular domain news aggregator, patentville.com went from a parked page at Sedo to an active website that is still in the very early stages of development.

According to the About Us page on its website, “We are working on bringing an idea information resource for you at PatentVille.com in the coming months.  Please email us at information at patentville.com and let us know if you would like to see us include a specific area related to inventions, patents and ideas.”

If for any reason Zynga thinks it’s going to have an easy time getting the domain name without plunking down some serious cash, there’s not much doubt the owner of patentville.com will stay on the offense.

As I pointed out in my previous story, the owner of patentville.com is Michael P. Eddy, a registered Patent attorney who knows a thing or two about trademarks, copyrights, patents and domain names.  His law office also offers services related to domain disputes. 

Plans for patentville by Zynga?

Zynga has not revealed any details or plans for patentville. 

Outside of this story and a trademark application in Europe, nothing else is known.

Categories
News Video Games

MindJolt acquires Bill Kara’s Hallpass Media: What you may not know

Mindjolt Hallpass Media

Like many a domainer, I’ve been keeping up on Bill Kara and Hallpass Media since he made news by purchasing the domain name cookinggames.com for $350,000. 

Over the past year, his company has kept busy with a series of launches including cookinggames.com, virtualpets.com, dressup.com and others. 

Late yesterday I received news from Bill that his company Hallpass had been sold to MindJolt.  I had already stepped away from the computer when I got the e-mail.  By the time the story hit the news wire at the New York Times and TechCrunch, it didn’t take long for domain bloggers to pick up on the headlines with DomainGang being the first to run the story, followed by Mike Berkens over at The Domains.

Of course, the New York Times and TechCrunch failed to point out — as domain bloggers have not, that Hallpass Media is more than just an online gaming network, with the company’s developed properties come some of its other greater assets — like the people and of course, some of the world’s best untapped gaming domain names.

According to Bill (who currently lives in Canada), “Going forward, we plan to build out more of my former gaming domains which is going to be alot of fun having more resources at my disposal.  Plus I am relocating my family to LA… no more snow for me.”

Smart, strategic move by MindJolt.

Categories
News Trademarks Video Games

Zynga applies for a trademark on the word: Patentville

patentville

If you thought Zynga’s trademark application for ville was the last of Zynga’s interesting European trademark applications, think again.

This week the gaming company filed for a trademark on the word “Patentville”, with the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM), the official trade marks and designs office of the European Union. 

According to the application, the trademark was filed to cover the following goods and services:

Leather and imitations of leather, and goods made of these materials and not included in other classes; animal skins, hides; trunks and travelling bags; umbrellas, parasols and walking sticks; whips, harness and saddler; bags.

Clothing, footwear, headgear; clothing, namely, t-shirts, sweatshirts, socks, jackets, button down shirts, polo shirts, dresses, skirts, jeans, shorts, sweatpants, aprons and headwear.

Education; providing of training; entertainment; sporting and cultural activities; entertainment services, namely, incentive award programs designed to reward program participants who create new inventions or engage in the creation of patentable ideas; entertainment services, namely, providing online computer and electronic games, enhancements within online computer and electronic games, and game applications within online computer and electronic games; entertainment reviews of computer games and information relating to computer games; entertainment services provided via virtual environments in which users can interact through social games for recreational, leisure or entertainment purposes.

patentville trademark application

What about the domain name: Patentville.com?

What’s strange about this trademark application by Zynga, is that the gaming company doesn’t own the domain name, patentville.com. 

Does not owning the dot com web address mean Zynga has nothing planned online for patentville? 

It wouldn’t be the first time Zynga didn’t own the web address for one of its properties, as seen by its Fishville game which allows you to create your own aquarium on Facebook.  The gaming company uses fishville.net, instead of fishville.com.

So who owns the patentville.com domain name? 

The Law Office of Michael P. Eddy owns the domain, which is currently parked for sale at Sedo.  Michael P. Eddy is also the owner of  patent.org.

Categories
News Trademarks Video Games

Zynga files for trademark on Farmville English Countryside: Guess who owns the domain? … and it’s not Zynga

Farmville English Countryside

Last month, I wrote about how Zynga filed for the European trademark on the word “ville”, which sparked a series of news stories and blog posts over the controversial nature of the application by the gaming company.  Writers from around the web ranging from CNET to Business Insider weighed in on the topic.

Well, now Zynga has filed another trademark this week over its latest launch: English Countryside, an expansion to one of its top games, Farmville.

farmville english countryside trademark application

What about the domain names?

While it looks as if someone is cybersquatting on the URL farmvilleenglishcountryside.com (registered in late February according to Whois), the generic (and non-controversial) version of the name, englishcountryside.com, also isn’t owned by Zynga.  It’s owned by none other than Mike Berkens, the Editor of the blog The Domains who happens to own some of the top generic domains in the world.

Over the last year, Zynga has acquired a number of domain names on the aftermarket prior to launching its properties publicly, like Cityville.com for $38,225 and Rewardville.com for $4,500.  But in the case of “English Countryside”, a term that refers to the hundreds of cottages and rolling hills around England, looks like Zygna opted to stick with Farmville.com — a name it acquired from another famous domain investor: Frank Schilling of domainnamesales.com.