Company wins three letter domain name through arbitration.
Smith Travel Research, Inc, which provides hotel benchmarking services, has won the three letter domain name STR.com at arbitration.
In the decision by a National Arbitration Forum panelist, the respondent was found to have registered the domain in bad faith and have no legitimate interests in the domain.
The respondent used the domain name for a travel web site, earning referral fees for sending traffic to travel sites. The logo at the top of the site reads “STR.com Search for Travels & Reservations / Book hotels online”. Many of the pages of the site are not complete and say development will be finished in Spring 2009.
The respondent argued that the complainant merely provides research to the hotel industry, whereas STR.com provides hotel bookings to consumers. The arbitrator didn’t buy it, and suggested that the domain was registered to specifically target Smith Travel Research.
Smith Travel Research’s web site is STRGlobal.com.
Read the arbitrator’s decision here.
Uhhh what? says
Call the police — someone’s just been robbed at gunpoint of a very valuable domain name.
Domain Investor says
I suspect the former owner did not use an IP lawyer because of some of the comments by respondent.
Considering the market value of STR.com, he made a mistake in judgement.
Johnny says
As far as I am concerned the National Arbitration Forum and it’s panelists in this case are accessories to a crime.
Of course that is a stretch, but it’s really not so far out there either.
I can’t wait until a case like this involves IBM or Coke. Do you think the panelist would be impartial if it were IBM or Coke starting a new three letter venture that treaded on someone, somewhere, somehow in the world? We all know they would take the side of a the big corp, not the generally humble domain owner.
Another thing, three letters can mean so many things, something the panelist I’m certain did not take into consideration.
This was a crime….my condolences to the Respondent. Truly sad.
Andrew Allemann says
Johnny – the panelist said he did consider it, but the use by the respondent for hotels ‘clearly’ targeted the complainant.
Reece Berg says
This should serve as a wake-up call to any short domain owners who think they can get away with doing whatever they want with their domain just because it’s short.
I used to own EELL.com and if I would have been dumb enough to put computer ads on it (DELL.com), I would have fully deserved the consequences.
D says
This is absurd decision. Another is recently rwa.org, there should be an UDRP moratorium on 2-3 or 4 character domains.
Nancy says
I hope the original owner make a lawsuit and get back his domain
ben says
please file court case and recover your domain.
I hope this was your strategy all along, if not you have just been robbed !!
National Arbitration Forum has become a joke.
Class Action action this entity should be the top priority by domain investors.
Andrew Allemann says
I would stop and wonder if the respondent is at fault here. If he hadn’t put a travel site up he wouldn’t have lost the domain. Did he perhaps put it up only because of the hotel research company?
bernard says
The domain was registered in 1993, and after 16 years of domainer care, the domain is just picked up by a serious company for a few bucks.
Honestly, I am really LOL.
ben says
Hire a lawyer fight the case like barcelona.com guy owner did.
I am sure plenty of lawyers would take on this case for differed payment.
D says
“I would stop and wonder if the respondent is at fault here”
In normal legal enviroment they would never had a chance to prove the registration was made in bad faith.
UFO says
Common,
Domainers need to get it through their seemingly “thick skulls” that whatever they do they should never move in the direction of another party that may have an interest in a business line similar to the domain name they have.
Trademark and common law isn’t that difficult really, just know that you should never ever had adverts in the same category as that discussed above.
I’d say there is a 99% chance that the domain owner would have retained that domain if they hadn’t had similar adverts to the complainant. Is PPC that valuable to seriously high value domain names given the risk in certain situations?
stu says
Everybody knows wipo,udrp are corrupt that’s why the domain authority icann will be out of business soon…..i would file a lawsuit right away,the complainant has no TM and is not publicly known.it’s a terrible decision….