Domain name of a sports team

[maxeaus]

G,day, i recently purchased a domain named sydneyspirit.com. The domain was picked up as expired, and has good link juice dating back from the Sydney olympics and in the recent few years a photo website.

One month ago Sydneys only basketball team, the razorbacks anounced that they were to be named Sydney Spirit for this years competition.

My question is should i approach the owners of the team whether they would like to buy the name?

They have announced that they have applied for a trademark for the name. Can i park the site as a basketball site?

They have currently registered the .com.au version of the name, but their site is not yet up and running.

 

[evertonian7uk]

firstly,

dont approach them offering it for sale,

dont park the domain either,

if they have applied for the TM on it, you'll need to develop the name now - so put no ads on the site, make no profit from it,

it all depends on what your usage is for the domain, my personal opinion is why not try and make an agreement with them, since there only called Sydney Spirit for one year, loan them the domain or something.

or better yet give it to them as a gift!

 

[maxeaus]

Give it to them as a gift! Thats a bit generous isnt it! :bah: As the law stands i dont think they have any devine right to own it unless i target basketball adds from the parked site and then they may reverse hijack me i guess. I dont see a problem with non competing adds. Or am i wrong? I dont want to be seen as a cybersquatter either, so i just want to know exactly where i stand realy.

 

[evertonian7uk]

were as they dont have the devine right to own it, shortly it will become there TM, which opens up a whole new section, perhaps they could start with reverse hijacking, or maybe just put you under so much crap you decide to hand it over,

as i said it comes down to your usage of the domain now, after all you have to prove you didnt reg the name because you knew there name was changing as was hoping to make a quick buck from it.

there are many ways to keep and lose this domain, the question is, how far can you go?

and finally, as for giving it as a "gift" can you read betwen lines?

 

[maxeaus]

Yes, i suspected the "gift" part was ambiguous. People in Australia in similar situations as me , ie: owners of the .com of a registered TM .com.au are under no right/obligation to hand over their domains. Infact one such case involving the owner of crown.com against crowncasino.com.au has again and again been thrown out of court in favour of the crown.com owner. This domain (crowncasino.com.au) is owned by Australias Packer family, formerly the richest family in Australia. Sidenote Australias richest man is now Iron Ore king Andrew "Twiggy" Forest.

 

[evertonian7uk]

your example of crown.com V crowncasino.com.au really isnt a good example, simply because crown and crowncasino are two different things, however your case is a direct link, the teams name is your domain name and there TM'ing that name, which again means you need to develop a site ASAP none basketball related so that no bad faith can be proved, as i said above you need to prove you didnt reg the name once you knew they were changing the name, in your OP you had stated that:

One month ago Sydneys only basketball team, the razorbacks anounced that they were to be named Sydney Spirit for this years competition

you then stated that:

i recently purchased a domain named sydneyspirit.com.

so recently could mean within the last month after you knew of the change, or it could mean 2 months ago, either way your going to need to defend the name at one point i would suspect, purely because your thinking about offering it to them for sale.

so this brings up the burning question, why did you reg the name in the first place? what was your plan for it?

 

[maxeaus]

Cheers, i appreciate you spending time analysing this. Actually i purchased the name because of the link juice it was getting, primarily as Sydney Spirit was a logo used during the year 2000 Olympics in Australia and i assume the domain was used somehow in the promotion of Sydney 2000 Olympics.

Seems there was a lot of links established because of this on Google. The site(domain) was then bought by someone who operated a photography( last 5 years) website, primarily about Sydney. He let this name expire.

My reason for buying is soley on the premis of advertising Sydney accomodation by hopefully using the link juice on offer, parking it. It was not untill on further examination of Googleing the name i discovered fresh links popping up for the basketball team.

Infact there appears to be a further dispute between the Bendigo Spirit (womans basketball team) and the Sydney Spirit about Sydneys use of the term Spirit! Its getting messy now!!! LOL

After fully analysing all that has been said so far ive decided to do a few things. (1) not offer the domain for sale to the SydneySpirit. (2) Not target Basketball in any way. (3) Put the name up for sale on Sedo at a modest price. (3) Keep the site parked as it is at present. I think being an Australian owning this name dose me no favours. Somebody from "SWEDEN" for example would not have to worry about any legal issues and would be able to use the domain without incident for whatever purpose they choose.

 

[jimnewberge]

Develop it as a tourisim site for sydeney promoting "Sydnmey spirt" and how much spirit the city has with festivals, parades, events etc etc etc. that is the safest thing to do with it. Then you could include a small part about basketball team etc as well as other sports teams in sydeny and nothing could be said

"Show your sidney spirit"

 

[maxeaus]

Thanks for spending the time on this with me guys, i appreciate it, as i am much clearer on what i can and cannot do now. You probably saved me from doing something stupid! :lol: I consider the case closed. Cheers