What's the best way to protect your domain...

[gazzip]

...from greedy reverse hijackers if you are not ready to develop it into a full website ?

I have a generic domain and it appears that a couple of people have recently got Trademarks for close variations of the term, ie: one without the hyphen and the other as a plural.

The filing dates of the new ones are October 2008 & March 2008.

The exact two words for my domain did have a trademark for it previously but it run out in 2002.. the domain was first reg'd in 1998 and i have owned it for almost 2 years. My intentions for the domain is only to sell if its an offer I can't refuse...if not I would be happy to develop it one day, I already know exactly what I want to do with it but it would require additional money/skills.

so, other than applying for a Trademark what's the best option for playing it safe...I really don't want to get my little ass WIPOed


1) Leave the name parked (still for sale...incase the right offer comes along).

2) Leave the name parked but not for sale.

3) Make a landing page with a logo saying contact or coming soon ?

4) Make the domain not resolve.

5) Put up a crappy page with (free) related links or news articles.

6) Other...all ideas/suggestions are welcome


Also how complicated is getting a Trademark to protect it, is it slow and expensive ? If so any idea of the costs involved.


Thanks, :tu:



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[lzy]

I would throw up a landing page with a spiffy logo and a huge COMING SOON text below along with an enquiry email.

 

[-REECE-]

Outsource (or pay a college kid) a few bucks to make a minisite. Simple and definitely well worth it.

Using an offshore registrar like NameVault.com can protect you from incidents like Kentucky, provided requests aren't made directly to the registry (Kentucky was a registrar-level request). This won't protect you from a UDRP but will possibly save you other headaches.

I live in Canada, so I'm not 100% sure how the trademark process works where you're located, however in Canada it's much easier to incorporate/register the domain as a business than file a trademark application -- can be done fairly easily in a day with minimal paperwork.