Peculiar UDRPs: Recent.net, Than.net, They.net
Sunday, March 7th, 2010
UDRP filing goes after three highly generic .net domain names.
Here’s a domain name dispute filing that must be complicated: someone has filed a UDRP for Recent.net, Than.net, and They.net. The dispute was filed with National Arbitration Forum, which does not disclose the complainant’s identity until a decision is rendered.
On the face of it, these seem like very generic domain names. But when you dig into the whois history, you notice similarities with all of the domain names.
-currently registered to “Skelton Logic” in Australia
-previous registrant Vonny Ling of Singapore in January 2010
-several whois registrant changes in 2009 that are the same for each domain name
On the outset, it looks like it might be a case of someone using UDRP to challenge a domain theft. Several companies have used UDRP when their three character domain names were stolen, and panelists have granted the domain names given the circumstances.
But using UDRP to get three very generic domain names will prove extremely challenging. The complainant will have to prove some sort of trademark rights in the terms recent, they and than. That will be quite difficult. Unless the details are surprising, this seems like a case that will more likely need to be settled in court rather than UDRP.
Related posts:
seems a reverse domain hijacking
We were offered these names (plus a couple more) a few times from April – June 2009, from someone that appeared to be a Korean. Definitely smelled fishy then, and more so now.
Yep, I was offered these domains as well. Strongly considered it but with the “too good to be true” pricing and urgency it smelled off. Wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that these had been stolen.
[...] wrote about the case earlier this month, suggesting that the UDRP dispute must be over stolen domain names. UDRP is sometimes used to regain control of [...]