Suit claims WIPO panel was wrong in UrbanHome.com decision.
Last week Michael Berkens wrote about a UDRP decision for UrbanHome.com.
A WIPO panel ruled that the domain name should be transferred to Urban Home of Oxnard, California.
Now the respondent, Technology Online, LLC, has filed a federal lawsuit (pdf) in Nevada to stop the transfer.
Technology Online argues that the panel erred in ordering the domain transferred and is asking for declaratory relief.
Although it may have a point about how the domain is generic, the plaintiff again avoids disclosing when exactly it acquired the domain name. In its UDRP response, Technology Online says the domain was registered in 1998. It says the same thing in the lawsuit. But Technology Online acquired it later. I’m not sure why it didn’t just come out with the date in its suit as it will certainly have to answer the question eventually.
Most of the times the registration dates implies the acquisition date as well.
The complainant didn’t question the 1998 registration date from what I saw.
The panelist assumed that the owner of the domain name UrbanHome.com was NOT the first registrant of the domain when that was registered in 1998. There was absolutely no evidence for this assumption. And the panelist then assumed that the current owner bought the domain at some arbitrary date that suited his decision.
The point is if the acquisition date really matters. It doesn’t. Owner is using the domain in it’s descriptive meaning and that is the end of the case. The trademark is ridiculous.
The panel addresses the fact that the domain was acquired at a later date.
Why wouldn’t one acquire the rights of the registration date when the domain is purchased? The whois information doesn’t change, and until it does, I would think those rights would transfer as well…
The panel has no proof of that as they don’t produce any proof. Complainant didn’t say that.
Where did that came from?
I don’t say that the owner didn’t acquire the domain name at a later date (which it did) but the panel assumed that and also assumed a date of acquisition that suited the decision.
I think the respondent kind of implied it by mentioning the previous use of the domain.
We don’t know exactly which facts the complainant submitted since we can’t see their full complaint.
I purchased this domain, urbanhome.com, from the original registrant when his furniture store went under in early 2008. I also bought all of the sellers “rights,title, good will, and interest” as well as “any and all trademark rights associated with the domain”.
When I later sold it, I transferred all of the above to the new owner as well.
Whether the current owner is the same as the one I sold it to is unclear, but one would think that the rights transfer should still have some merit towards the original creation date.