Can even contacting a business with a potential legal interest be

[niceguy]

a risk - greater than if you didn't contact them to begin with? Is there a way to contact a potential buyer while leaving the potential legal situation "neutral"?

Real example:

I own porthongkong.com (sounds nice when you say it, has a nice ending rythme
My plan is to develop this domain (and 27 others that I own in the port"nameofport".com series, and turn it into a content based port network representing the 16 of the 20 busiest ports in the world - with the idea that it would be adsense funded.

The queston is - before I do all that work - if I offer any of the port .coms to the ports themselves or to major port users will that offer in itself (made prior to the development of the sites) be able to be used against me in WIPO or URDP stuff? Also is there any way to avoid the potential use of my solicitation by writing "Without Prejudice" at the head of the email or - to specifically state that "The world port network is currently in the process of being developed, but that before its launched you may be interested in this domain name" as part of the soliciting email.

I am in the process of gathering data for this project, but a wholesale sales of all 28 port domains would be good too.

Thoughts/comments

 

[labrocca]

I believe the answer is yes. It will be harmful in a WIPO case but there are other factors to consider in a WIPO so it's not automatically going to cause a lose.

 

[don 944 LA]

Yep, having a name , especially underdeveloped, and offering it for sale to an entity that may have ANY claim to a copyright will automatically loose. It is not considered "Fair Use"
here's a link http://www.icann.org/dndr/udrp/uniform-rules.htm#5http://www.icann.org/dndr/udrp/uniform-rules.htm#5

WIPO follows the ICANN UDRP ( world intellectual property Organization, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy)

I would read up on this before you do anything.

Don

EDIT:

b. Evidence of Registration and Use in Bad Faith. For the purposes of Paragraph 4(a)(iii), the following circumstances, in particular but without limitation, if found by the Panel to be present, shall be evidence of the registration and use of a domain name in bad faith:

(i) circumstances indicating that you have registered or you have acquired the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring the domain name registration to the complainant who is the owner of the trademark or service mark or to a competitor of that complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of your documented out-of-pocket costs directly related to the domain name; or

(ii) you have registered the domain name in order to prevent the owner of the trademark or service mark from reflecting the mark in a corresponding domain name, provided that you have engaged in a pattern of such conduct; or

(iii) you have registered the domain name primarily for the purpose of disrupting the business of a competitor; or

(iv) by using the domain name, you have intentionally attempted to attract, for commercial gain, Internet users to your web site or other on-line location, by creating a likelihood of confusion with the complainant's mark as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation, or endorsement of your web site or location or of a product or service on your web site or location.

 

[jberryhill]

Am I dense, or do you keep asking the same question every week?

http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/decisions/html/2001/d2001-0001.html

 

[niceguy]

Am I dense, or do you keep asking the same question every week?

http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/decisions/html/2001/d2001-0001.html

No - John the question is still there from 2 weeks ago when I asked it....
Don revived the old post by responding to it today.

However while we are on the topic.....I'm in the final stages of securing marketing right to a domain that was previously used (consistantly over a period of 6-7 years) in a particular business.

The domain is no longer needed for the "old use" - however the domain has significant generic value and in particular to a couple of large end-users (that are in completely different businesses than in the business that the orignal domain was used in).

My concern is NOT that these businesses could/would fight to get the name in general (that can happen any time)- but that their "case for stealing the name" would be strengthened by the fact that they could use our solicitation to them to purchase the name against us.

So I guess back to the question - can one solicit a business to purchase a domain name and include some kind of wording in the solicitation that would make it illegal or difficult for the business to use the solicitation itself as valid point in a lawsuit should the business try to steal the name from the domainer?

Peace,
Tarry G

 

[DNQuest.com]

There is no straight forward answer to this quesiton since we would need to know the domain and the business yo uwish to solicite. But is the domain contained a TM which the business has rights and you solicite them, that could be used as a "bad faith" evidence. If the domain is truly generic in nature, it may be a different story, but people have lost generic names before, so keep that in mind.