Second UDRP for domain name is rejected.
A National Arbitration Forum panelist has denied a Phoenix soccer store’s second attempt to get SoccerMall.com through a UDRP.
Hassan Shams owns a store called Soccer Mall, and managed to recently get a service mark on the principal registrar for “soccer mall”. The trademark claims first use in 2000.
He filed a UDRP with National Arbitration Forum in August. The decision indicates that the domain name was registered a couple months before Shams’ first use date in the trademark application. So the panelist denied the UDRP on the basis that the domain name could not have been registered in bad faith since the registration pre-dated any possible trademark rights.
As it turns out, the domain name has changed hands multiple times since the original registration, and Shams’ lawyer made this point when he resubmitted the dispute in November.
The panelist said this was an attempt to take “a second bite at the cherry” to get a favorable response. After all, the information submitted in the second case was readily available the first time around, had the complainant merely done the research. He refused to consider the rest of the case on its merits.
Nat Cohen says
Seems like this unjustified refiling would have been deserving of a RDNH finding, similar to sarten.com and doctorgrowitall.com (source: RDNH.com)
Bystander says
Agreed. This should have been Reverse Domain Name Hijacking. The complainant was represented by attorneys who should have known better.
In addition, the respondent has had to endure responding to this process twice in the complainant’s two failed attempts to get hold of this domain name. This case must surely represent harassment. There is something in UDRP about harassment constituting RDNH, isn’t there.
Andrew Allemann says
Not disagreeing with the RDNH assessment, although I’d like to point out that the domain owner didn’t respond to either case.
DNPric.es says
Greedy. The domain name is listed at AfterNIC, buy it now for $9,500.00.
Garth says
How does a second filing get accepted to be heard? If the parties are the same, it should have been rejected by the facilitator?
John Berryhill says
“How does a second filing get accepted to be heard?”
The check doesn’t bounce.
Garth says
So no rules in place to stop this?
John Berryhill says
Well, my wife didn’t even like me when I met her, but I kept trying.
Kevin Murphy says
This is all very interesting, but surely the real question should be: how small are the complainants’ mouths? Cherries are absolutely tiny. Nobody needs a second bite at them except maybe hamsters.
Andrew Allemann says
The phrase did strike me as a but unusual.