Some common legal questions...

[d0main]

I'd appreciate it if someone would help clarify these situations to me.

1. If the domain itself is a trademark that consists of dictionary words (ie not made-up), and it has parking page that shows ads unrelated to the TM, is the owner still liable for getting sued? It was not registered in bad faith, and the site does not profit off of the brand.
2. If the domain owner reaches out to end-users, can the current owner get sued even if the term is NOT a trademark. The end-user could prove using the email/phone calls that the domain was registered in bad faith/the current owner has no rights to use it, despite the fact that it is a generic domain (eg. headsets.com)

Thanks

 

[bmugford]

1.) If the domain is a common word and not infringing on a TM, if the domain is Apple.org and you have parked pages with recipes for Apple Pie you should be fine.
2.) This is more tricky. It depends how generic the term is. If you have a generic domain like "MusicProduction.com" there is nothing wrong with contacting companies that might be interested in it.

However, if it is a very specific domain with made up terms you can still have issues even without a TM.

Brad