Two prior TLD applicants sue over specific top level domains.
As plans for a 2013 rollout of new top level domains marches forward, two companies have sued ICANN to stop it from issuing certain top level domain names.
Both lawsuits come courtesy of companies that applied in the “proof of concept” round back in 2000.
Earlier this week DomainIncite reported about a suit filed by Name.Space against ICANN. Name.space runs an alternative root with 482 top level domains.
Today I received a copy of a complaint (pdf) brought by Image Online Design. It specifically targets the .web domain name, which it applied for in 2000 in the “proof of concept” round. It wasn’t approved. It makes a .web top level domain available in alternative DNS root systems.
I think the argument that these companies have rights to the names because they run them in alternative root systems is a bit of a long shot. That they applied for domains in the proof of concept round might have more legs.
Image Online Design is represented by David Steele, the attorney who frequently files cybersquatting lawsuits on behalf of Verizon.
page howe says
hey IOD, what about my name from 1999, i registered about 20 i think, do i still have them? funny even then .web had some juice that they were “given” .web at an icann board meeting, then got wallowed up into the 2000 round mess….
page howe says
nice wayback machine, heres the .web lawsuit against the 1998 awarding of new tlds,(what we can call “the lost round”. Interesting reading about trademarking second level etc
http://www.icann.org/en/news/correspondence/iod-v-core-22jun00-en.htm
Christopher Ambler says
Page, all .web registrations are still in the database and zone file and have been since they were first taken. As you will recall, we were told by IANA (Jon Postel and Bill Manning at the time) to demonstrate a working registry, which we did.
The subsequent actions of ISOC and then ICANN changed the plans (and promises) of IANA, of course.
It’s been almost 20 years since this all started and we’ve not gone away nor given up. There’s something to be said for finishing what we started. 😉
Jay Fenello says
What has happened to the name space since ICANN is criminal. Glad to see these lawsuits.
John UK says
I second Jay’s comment.The more lawsuits against ICANN the better in mny view.