Re: list lawyers - read this

[Wallace White <wallace@remdesign.com>]

Huw Powell wrote:
> 
> > The Cyberpiracy Bill provides for statutory damages of $100,000 per
> > domain name against cyberpirates who register domain names that include
> > famous trademarks.
> 
> 1.  a trademark is a trademark, it doesn't have to be famous.

Right, but the law he's referring to does specifically project "famous
trademarks," as I understand it. 

There was an article in the NY Times a few weeks ago about a 17-year old
who owned the domain name msdwonline.com. Morgan Stanley Dean Witter
(MSDW) had just launched their online trading site and had contacted him
about purchasing the domain name. The owner (or rather his father, who
it turns out owns lots of domain names of the <company>online.com
format) wrote back that he would consider selling for a six-figure sum.
MSDW then immediately filed suit under this law.

Interestingly, there was no msdwonline.com web site until this all
started, and now the boy has put "Mud Sweat Downhill World" as his
mountain bike-related web site. (If you want to find the article at
nytimes.com, search for that phrase.)

Lawyers quoted in the article weren't sure if MSDW would be able to
defend their name as a "famous trademark" because it is relatively new,
as the companies merged and took that name only two years ago.

- Wallace
  '87 5kcstq 161k