discuss Should I sell it and how?

Pose as a customer and ask them on social media why they are not answering mails sent to email.ba?

This is a touchy subject and it depends on if "BA" alone could even be considered a trademark.

Just because it's two letters, as silly as it sounds, I don't think precludes it from being an active trademark .. particularly if they are already actively and promoting using BA dot com. (@jberryhill?)

So *IF* (again, I'm not 100%) a UDRP panel were to consider "BA" a legitimate British A trademark *AND* you were the one reaching out to them for a sale, then depending on when you acquired the domain, that could be what is considered a "bad faith acquisition" .. meaning that it could be interpreted that you acquired the domain specifically to profit from British Airways' trademark.


All that said .. your best bet in this case would likely simply be to reach out to them about the emails. Tell them something like THEY need to be doing a better job distinguishing their domain from yours, and that by them not being careful enough with distinguishing their domain from yours, they could hurt your ability to start your own email business as you won't want your own clients getting their emails because your clients would consider their email as spam. (I certainly wouldn't start initial contact that aggressively though)

This is a pretty unusual (but not unique) situation where there is clearly a fair use of the domain completely outside the context of their trademark (even if it is one). So unless you did something to give the impression you were them (don't put on ads for travel) or try to profit from them (which includes reaching out to them to sell the domain), then there really is no issue at all with you owning and using the domain.


I recently helped a fellow domainer get the lawyer of a global top 100 brand to back off because they (falsely) accused him of trying to exploit their trademark because he had the domain listed for sale for what they thought was too high (it wasn't). So let me just say that you need to be very careful about the exact specific wording you use if you do contact them. Definitely don't mention anything about selling it to them in your opening email .. you need to steer the conversation in a way that invites them to ask about them buying the domain .. once they ask you first, then pretty much anything is fair game.


ADDED: All that said, if BA can't be considered a trademark .. then forget everything above, as you could approach them about buying the domain.


Good luck .. and please do let us know what happens!?

One recommendation I have heard is a soft sell of giving a courtesy forward of those emails to the company and see if that doesn't open up a dialog to sell them the domain. Not that I am recommending that, so if you choose to do so its at your own risk.

It is a bit uncertain if it could be considered bad-faith. No telling which way a UDRP panel would go, though maybe a seasoned lawyer could find a president on this sort of thing?

Even www.microsoft.ba could not get their .ba domain with udrp and lawyers. Open the homepage. It's registered since 2005.

I'm citizen of Bosnia, and our 2 ISO is BA.

Email ist just a tech word for providing email services.

koolishman said:

Pose as a customer and ask them on social media why they are not answering mails sent to email.ba?

Click to expand...

And ask your friends to ask the same question some weeks later.

Amar D said:

Even www.microsoft.ba could not get their .ba domain with udrp and lawyers.

Click to expand...

Did Microsoft try to acquire Microsoft.ba via UDRP? "Microsoft" is a unique and distinctive enough of a mark that they would likely win it if they tried (in my opinion). So many variables involved though, such as what was on the website, was the domain for sale? etc

More importantly, what are the actual rules and enforcement / dispute resolution policies for .ba? Not all ccTLD's even have the UDRP system.


Again .. I'm just very interested and therefore above-average knowledgeable on these sorts of issues .. I'm not a lawyer or IP expert. The best person to really answer these question with a much higher degree of certainty would be @jberryhill.