discuss Intimidation Tactics: Share the most absurd attempts at intimidation!

[DanSanchez]

Intimidation, legal or not, happens daily in the domain industry. I am an avid defender of private property and individual responsibility, personally, this is one of the most disgusting acts an individual can undertake to try to appropriate a domain name.

Now that I work at Epik, I am often tasked with answering emails from foolish individuals who purposely or not, try to misconstrue UDRP/Trademark rights try to intimidate the registrar into handing over a certain domain. This means they have already tried to contact the owner of the domain and they have failed, but it's not always the case.

In this particular instance, the individual attached a 2013 company registration from Turkey! The domain was owned by a client since 2009. The claimant is in textile and serves a very small local audience. Not only that, but the domain in question here has a .com.tr counterpart, which they recently registered in December 2019.

Here is the email he sent me directly:

During my research, I discovered they were going to rebrand to the (shorter) name they recently registered and felt entitled enough to steal the .com by coercion and intimidation.

Let's learn from each other to proactively protect our assets. Domains are unique, powerful, and valuable business tools. I am happy to share what my process is for establishing an appropriate response to help you fight this constant battle.

Share your recent experiences of fraudulent attempts to separate you from your rightful property.

Some relevant questions:

• How can we establish a standard operating procedure for aggressive defense of digital assets?
• How can the community come together to learn from each other?
• How can we establish legal rights to our property when someone (unscrupulous or not) comes demanding our property by force and coercion?

Warning: I am not an attorney.

 

[GoWeb]

100% NO !!! Sorry for being so loud and blunt guys .. lol .. particularly since I know your intentions are obviously to be helpful to others. But the #1 weapon domainers have against unethical and immoral lawyers and "apparent" trademark owners is to pretend to be stupid and string them along and let them continue to make false statements and mistakes. The more mistakes they make the better. Like in @pooky's case the person used the word "profit". Just by the very fact they used that word legally opens the door to now allow @pooky to make future counter offers, whereas if they used the words "compensation for your time" any counter-offer by Pooky could have been used against him depending on how the initial contact was worded.

My advice is to never show what you know and always be as vague as possible. The dumber they think you are, the more aggressive they will be and the more likely they will be to do/say something that will later go to prove their bad faith. Even go so far as to ask seemingly stupid questions about why they think they have rights to the domain etc etc. The less you say and the more they say means that if it actually does end up in legal proceedings, you have an arsenal of proof and evidence supporting you and proving the bad faith of the complainant.

So the bottom line is NEVER EVER "educate" or "inform" potential complainants, and instead ALWAYS string them along and allow them to make mistakes.

Eventually when you have enough proof of bad faith you can use that to shut things down if you are 100% sure. But until you are 100% sure of your case, say as little as possible and get them to say too much.

Most importantly .. UDRPs are supposed to be standard and have rules .. but there are indeed many grey-zone cases where you can never be 100%. Or even worse .. those same grey-zone case where one panellist would vote one way and a different panellist would vote another way (even with the same information/evidence) .. so it's for that reason why it's always ideal to get as much supporting evidence in your favour as possible. In borderline cases unethical behaviour could make the difference if you can prove it. Which means whenever possible, NEVER giving them information or help and ALWAYS try to get them to say as much as possible.

In fact, it wouldn't even be a bad idea to pretend to be stupid on the subject of trademarks and ask them why they think they are legally entitled to the domain .. because if they come back with reasons that are not actual rules/laws that would go some ways to prove their bad faith.

Also .. never ever even use the term UDRP unless they use it first. NEVER! lol

Correct, that's the right way to deal with this.
If you try to educate your enemy, you will have lost half the war already.
A polite and firm "no thank you" sounds like the best response.

 

[bmugford]

Correct, that's the right way to deal with this.
If you try to educate your enemy, you will have lost half the war already.
A polite and firm "no thank you" sounds like the best response.

I don't know. I have fought off several meritless claims by pushing back.

It is not about educating the other party as much as showing them you are not a push over.
Often times these people are just looking for the low hanging fruit.

It does help though if you have experience and know what you are talking about, and can address the issues in a measured manner.

Brad

 

[tomcarl]

HallOfShame.com is a good site to mention to them.

 

[Croissant]

Thanks for sharing Dan, and all sharing your ideas.

I like the idea of preparing something as a template,but simply I would say "no thank you"

or

if they are Turkish (I am Turkish,too) , we can reply with this video
(as they are dreaming to receive the domain after that email :D )

hayaller = dreams
hayatlar = life(s) , reality :D

 

[BrandAptly.com]

Thanks for sharing Dan, and all sharing your ideas.

I like the idea of preparing something as a template,but simply I would say "no thank you"

or

if they are Turkish (I am Turkish,too) , we can reply with this video
(as they are dreaming to receive the domain after that email :D )

hayaller = dreams
hayatlar = life(s) , reality :D

...and THAT is how you 'Talk Turkey' to these jesters. Pun intended!

 

[HotKey]

There's not a one size fits all reply letter that can be presented, but I like the idea Sanchez has brought forward. We could have at least a base letter that may be modified to our situation. Some letters may require a "play dumb" approach as Ategy suggested, others deserve nothing more than to be kicked in the ass. Any reply though, whether it be a deserving ass-kicking or I'm just a dumb dude who registered this name because I like it, should be polite and professional. There are ways to formulate responses that can accommodate either avenue.

Truth of the matter is, a domain name at the outset is available to be registered by anyone on earth. Claiming property after the fact is preposterous and belligerent, for the most part. These people that come at us believe for what ever reason they have some sort of right on a human-readable IP address. They do not. A company or business is what you've made at it in the very moment you've made it, not some invisible claim that they believe everyone should know about. Really, it's absurd the sense of entitlement some folks have.

In 2014, I registered a single-character letter, "O" in an absolutely terrible new extension. The crappiest of the crap of extensions. The day after, I got a letter from someone, clearly thinking the fact that they had a trademark on a LETTER gave them rights over anyone else. I played dumb, not only because it was my first date, but also because I felt it was the best way to dissolve the situation. Besides, the mere act of registering a generic domain, does not equate TM infringement, and I knew this.

Here's the goombah from the "I have a TM, therefore I own everything" club, and my simple response and then his:

He decided to let it go, thank goodness. Whatever would I have done had he pursued it. Seriously though, after reading about Monster's loss, kindly posted by our Silentptnr, that has got to be the most pathetic example of someone taking advantage of an obviously corrupt WIPO representative for their own entitled gains. Companies that go this route, eg. Ganeden Biotech should be shunned by the entire business community imo for taking claim to something that was already legitimately claimed by someone else. Wishful thinking, obviously, but being buried in history will not change the fact that it happened. This makes WIPO look like a legalized form of thievery. Ugh!

 

[StartupsBrandsCom]

Hello, to add a comment, to the example letter' offered payment specification as

Although his big mistake (where you can tell he's not a professional) was using the word "profit" instead of "compensation for your time".

-to that, there is actually a domain profit per year, and that is the minimum cost of CPC advertising for the specific keyword/keywords in total, and that is somewhat acceptable criteria, maybe not generally considered as the factor but exists.
And after others mentioned in this thread, that sumoed by O.P. that domainers here as support would rather need principles than a template letters, I would suggest occassionally checking online Trade Mark database records US / UK / EU(DE) or other TM registrar when domain pretend to the niches from some of the globally regulated locally stringent markets interests.
Also as there are multitude of TM and Reg.Business names across the records with such names meeting widest possible extend(aside of fully imaginative brandables), eventually that would restrict formal communication if taken without objective estimate aside bureaucracy in reality, yet it is necessary for most to educate further to be able to prove some of their domain ownership rights/prerogative and some criteria are
- date of TM/BN vs. DN //who preceded
- business type / industry market vs. domain audience, intent for use // same or not
Etc. members here could add on.
Regards

 

[Pramanthas]

The need for a polite and professional attitude goes both ways.

Sometimes the inquiries are condescending, unnecessarily intimidating or start with such appallingly low offers that they end the negotiation before it can start.

 

[frank-germany]

about 2004 or so they use to yell at me on phone
"it's MY domain"

I used to ask them "why the heck are you calling me if its YOUR domain?"

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

Just send this...

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

So the bottom line is NEVER EVER "educate" or "inform" potential complainants, and instead ALWAYS string them along and allow them to make mistakes.

I tell my kids this advice... except for the stringing along bit. "Don't arm (educate) those that mean you harm".

It reminds me of Vito Corleone chastizing Sonny: "Don't tell anyone outside the family what you are thinking!".

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

The need for a polite and professional attitude goes both ways.

Sometimes the inquiries are condescending, unnecessarily intimidating or start with such appallingly low offers that they end the negotiation before it can start.

I bet there are many situations where a decision is made to try to aquire a domain and the process is intended to be a professional transaction...

...until this guy tells the board he can get the domain name for a lower price...

...and then the whole thing turns into a ...

 

[Pramanthas]

If "that guy" had shown a shred of intelligence and politeness, I would have even lowered my price a bit. Instead, he went on a further rant.

The domain was not listed for sale before that. After his rants, I put it up for sale for 15k, updated with a 1k increase in the BIN at regular intervals, in his honor.

His client probably thinks he tried his best.

 

[bulkdomainz]

If I have time, I'll play dumb. If I don't, I ignore the threats with respond with something like:

'Thank you for you email. The domain is available for sale at xxxx. I look forward to doing business with you'.

I never hear back.

 

[Name Trader]

I spent a few months last year effectively destroying the lawyer of a global top 100 brand who was trying to intimidate a fellow domainer.

He behaved extremely unethically and I put him in his place.

Really surprising how far some people are willing to go.

Can I refer my next TM dispute/UDRP to you?