Real estate firm sues owner of .co.
The owner of a .com domain name has filed a lawsuit (pdf) to get the .co version of their domain name. This is the first such .co federal anticybersquatting lawsuit I’m aware of (although there have been plenty of UDRPs and I don’t think a complainant has lost yet).
Real estate company Sibcy Cline filed the in rem lawsuit against SibcyCline.co.
The firm registered both SibcyCline.com and Sibcy.com way back in 1995. But someone else registered the .co domain name in July last year.
Sibcy Cline sent a couple cease and desist letters to the registrant, who finally responded by saying he’d sell the domain name for $1,500. Sibcy Cline rejected the offer, only to find that the domain name was transferred to another registrant shortly thereafter.
The lawsuit seeks transfer of the domain name.
This clearly seems to be bad faith, nothing generic about that domain.
Pure TM cybersquatting, I’m 100% with the company here.
@Andrew
What’s an ‘in rem’ lawsuit?
@Joe: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=in+rem&l=1
I don’t understand filing an in rem against a .co in US if the court has no jurisdiction over it.
@ Joe –
in rem is against the domain name itself. since the owner is apparently in India, they have jurisdiction issues.
@ Nick – They’re claiming jurisdiction based on the domain registrar, eNom.
It is a pure cybersquatting case but it has ramifications for the .co ccTLD. This is a can of worms that some will wish had not been opened.
may every .co owner suffer the same fate lol
woooooo!
you were warned
Wow self righteous
Start a legal battle rather than negotiate them down to $750
Guess with 100,000’s .co’s reg’d in bad faith it had to happen eventually
Buy generic names in .co, that is not generic.
I mean something like nevadahomes.co or Californiahomes.co would be ok but this is to descriptive….
From white pages:
There are 70 people with the last name “Sibcy” in the United States.
punks.
Disgusting cybersquatters. Making everyone’s life harder and muddying the waters. Blatant infringement.
That’s blatant cyber squatting. I have nearly 80 .CO domains (over 40 one word ones) and I have not cyber squatted. Keep it generic and away from the big trademarks. I had one company come after me for one of my domain names, however it is the name of an animal. I replied stating obvious facts to their lawyers and nothing came of it. Just a big company that snoozed nad is now beating its chest.
I love it how the .com owners dump on .co.
The only reason they do is because it is an immediate threat and a contender which will affect .com’s value in the long run.
It will bring .com down in value, it just depends on how much.
I agree with Damon. I doubt they would go after the .biz/.info version of their .com domains. They clearly see .CO as a competitor, which is good news for the extension.
Is init cheaper to just pay the guy $1500, then to file a lawsuit? Or is it the principal…
@ Joe
“I doubt they would go after the .biz/.info version of their .com domains. They clearly see .CO as a competitor, which is good news for the extension”
I don’t really think it is the case.
The .biz/info version is not an obvious typo.
CO starts out as “confusingly similar” in cases like this.
Brad