Google Launches Google Places 6 Days After Winning GooglePlaces.com Domain

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

Google won GooglePlaces.com domain 6 days ago.

Did Google wait to rebrand its Local Business Center to Google Places until it had won rights to the domain name GooglePlaces.com?

On March 2 the company filed a complaint with National Arbitration Forum to get the domain name GooglePlaces.com through Uniform domain-name Dispute Resolution Policy. The domain was owned by “Network Service” in California, with a registered owner named only “Anthonny”.

The National Arbitration Forum panel found in favor of Google on April 14, ordering that the domain name be transferred to Google.

It’s clear that Google has been working on this rebranding for a while, and it’s possible that it waited to rebrand until it won the (admittedly easy) case. But then again, Google doesn’t yet have control of the domain name as the transfer can take up to 10 days. In fact, if you type in GooglePlaces.com right now you’ll land on a parked page.

It makes me wonder — if you went through the trouble of getting the domain name through arbitration, why not wait just a few more days until you get the domain in your control before rebranding?

Further Reading:

  1. As Google Listen Launches, Domains Already Squatted
  2. Google Launches “Map Your Valentine”

3 Comments » - Posted in Policy & Law by

Comments

  1. double standards
    April 20th, 2010 | 10:35 am

    It is interesting that the .net and .org is owned by an SEO guy who uses the website -
    Google-KAI,com. He openly infringes on Google’s TM.

    Plus, GooglePlace.com is reg’d and pointed towards SEDO. Apparently, SEDO has relisted it.

    Why hasn’t Google shut down the sites mentioned above?
    It appears they are selective in who they go after.

    Whereas, Microsoft actively defends their TM with a legal baseball bat going for the knees.

  2. double standards
    April 20th, 2010 | 10:36 am

    It should say
    Sedo has ‘delisted’ it.

  3. Andrew Allemann
    April 20th, 2010 | 10:37 am

    @ double standards – I’ve noticed that Google rarely used UDRP until about a year ago. Then it picked up steam, going after lots of domains. In the case of domains such as GooglePlace.com, I think they’d probably send a C&D as the first move.

    Then again, Google needs to tread carefully given its parking business. I doubt it will bring out the sledgehammer any time soon.

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