Panel rules Twizzler.com owner can keep domain name.
Hershey, the company that makes the addicting Twizzlers licorice candy, has lost an arbitration case for the domain name Twizzler.com.
Raymond Mah registered the domain name in 1999 and said he had plans to create a puzzle game at the site. He pointed to the Oxford dictionary definition of Twizzle, which means “a twisting or spinning movement” as the idea for the name. At one point in 2001 he had a site at Twizzler.com about the idea for a brain puzzle and inviting interesting parties to contact him about working together on it.
Mah also pointed to numerous examples of a generic use of the term: Apple’s iPhone “Brain Twizzlerâ€; a children’s toy with the name “Spring Swings Twizzler Fun Rideâ€; in a footwear commercial broadcast on YouTube “Spike Jonze’s Twizzler – Lakai Commercial†where a skateboarder watches his skateboard twist and spin around while he is airborne; a puzzle game called TWIZZLE advertised on the “www.bobblebropok.com†website; another Twizzle puzzle game on the “www.neoos.ch†website; and the results from a Google search for “twizzle†which refers, inter alia, to a sailing yacht, figure skating fashion designs, a hair studio and a music blog.
The panelist determined that Mah had rights or a legitimate interest in the domain name and that it wasn’t registered in bad faith.
Louise says
Sounds like somebody came to court!
Steroids UK says
damn right he should have kept it, generic and singular.