Lovely find, Danny. See, even as liberal as I am, I would concur with you that this instance would be a violation of the UDRP and is wrong because the WHOIS data is being misrepresented, unless of course 'dog' lives at 123 street in DC, which I highly doubt or his phone has a 555 prefix, also highly doubtful.
No, I don't necessarily condone this instance, just as much as I don't condone corporate bullying to gain control of this domain if the WHOIS data had been accurate (Microsoft v MikeRoweSoft.com was a good example of an instance I also don't condone). On the same note, how can the registrars justify keeping registrants private but individuals themselves cannot?
I do wonder if Coke has pursued this case with arbitration (another issue we should delve into). I also wonder how proactive ICANN should be involved with these matters. I also wonder if then, we should require that Coke pay registration fees for all misspellings alowable, and require every organization to register all misspellings. I bet registrars would love this. In this case, it could seem reasonable that a company named Coca Co. in Podunk Utah has a server called 1a and uses it for a specific purpose, of which I'm sure is not the case regardless, but could be.
I also don't agree that the WHOIS data should be as public as it is. I don't appreciate everyone being able to mine the data as readily as they do. There have been times when I've checked my mail to find it overflowing with advertising that could have only been sent using the WHOIS database. I've also had individuals call me on the phone to demand that I relenquish a domain so that they can more easily find a certain other website named similar to one of mine; no need to go over how those conversations end. Or, a company in Spain who has the same name as a domain in which I've registered in good faith demanding that I 'give them their domain.' Needless to say, those conversations end in the same manner. In short, I don't appreciate my info being made public and understand why one would want to misrepresent themselves in order to maintain privacy, though I go to great lengths not to do so myself.
The IDN issue is on the same scale of what we're discussing here. Whether the organic spelling or the English form takes precedence is of particular concern to me. How about the word CocaCola spelled in Katakana (Japanese)? Should Coke also have the right to the ASCII form of 'their name' in every character set? OK, so beyond my knowledge level now.
The point then, that I'm trying to make is that even a trademark holder should not have an inherent right to register any given domain under any circumstance. But, the sunrise period does make sense. My reasoning for this, is that a domain/website is 1) an original work and 2) materially different and not confusingly similar to a physical product. In this case, the registrant has a valid website (obviously PPC, I think from goldkey but cannot remember their nameservers) and is not trying to misrepresent itself as
CocaCola.com. However, I do think that a company should be protected from malice. If it were 1) a duplicate website of Coke's, 2) used for a phishing scam, 3) and meant to do harm; then I would say that I definitely don't condone that behavior. But then again, I'm not truly as liberal as I make myself out to be.
aloha,
Randy Glass
A@L
On 5/7/07, Danny Younger <dannyyounger@yahoo.com> wrote:
Hello Randy,
Thanks for using cocaco1a.com as an example. Current
WHOIS data:
Registrant
Organization Name: smart thinkers
First Name: dog
Last Name: dog
Address 1: 123 street st
City: washington dc
StateProvince: DC
PostalCode: 20005
Country: US
Phone: +1.3015551212
Fax: +1.3015551213
EmailAddress: none
This WHOIS data, together with the registrant's
website content, illustrates a classic example of
typosquatting (which is illegal under U.S. law). It
also points out the registrar community could be doing
much, much more to police inaccurate WHOIS data.
I'm not sure I understand the point that you are
trying to make... are you condoning this type of
activity because of a view that current law is in a
state of flux? Sorry if I misunderstood where you are
heading with this...
Best wishes,
Danny
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