Majority of panel denies all three prongs of UDRP complaint while another confirms all three.
A World Intellectual Property Organization panel has ruled against Spanish company Mapfre in a UDRP case the company brought against MapFree.com.
The domain name belongs to Vertical Axis (Kevin Ham’s company). Vertical Axis argued that it registered the domain name for its generic meaning. It pointed out that is has registered many other domains that start with Map.
The majority of the panel found in Vertical Axis’ favor on all three parts of the UDRP. This is despite a limited number of links showing up on the parked domain that relate to Mapfre’s industry of insurance. The majority ruled that those links were incidental to the overall case.
One panelist dissented and said the domain should be transferred.
It’s kind of hard to believe that two panelists would find against the complainant on all three prongs of the UDRP while another would find in favor of the complainant on all three.
Vertical Axis was represented by ESQwire.com.
rob says
oh for gods sake, can we have some consistency please?!
in some cases having a parked page with ads relating to the claimant is a near death sentence for the respondent, yet now they say that it is just “incidental to the overall case”. this is hard evidence to me that these people just make it all up as they go along (possibly depending on how much they get paid above and under the table).
i reckon that statement and this case will be used a fair few times in future as a defense precedence/reference by respondents.
Gulab Jamon says
Spanish bias?
The three panelists in the mapfree.com UDRP case were:
Karen Fong (Presiding Panelist)
The Hon. Neil Brown QC (Panelist)
Mario A. Sol Muntañola (Dissenting Panelist)
It is astounding that Karen Fong and The Hon. Neil Brown QC would find AGAINST the complainant on all three prongs of the UDRP while Mario A. Sol Muntañola would find IN FAVOR of the complainant not just on one prong but all three prongs.
MAPFRE is a Spanish company with a Spanish heritage but now with branches in other parts of the world.
Mario A. Sol Muntañola of law firm Sol Muntañola & Asociados in Barcelona, Spain is Spanish.
According to udrpinfo.com Mario A. Sol Muntañola does seem to be a panellist chosen by a number of Spanish complainants.
Cervantes says
If instead of a 3 party panel it had been a 1 party panel with just Mario A. Sol Muntañola, the dissenting panelist, as the sole panelist then the domain name would have been confiscated.
Thank goodness for 3 party panels.
Mercator says
What next?
Will MAPFRE http://www.mapfre.com go after FREMAP http://www.fremap.com Where does it stop?
Mercator says
A ridiculous decision!
or MAPFREELY.org http://www.mapfreely.org ?