Domain clearly wasn’t registered in bad faith but panelist doesn’t find RDNH.
Yesterday I wrote about how a World Intellectual Property Organization panelist let6 California clothing company Reformation off the hook for reverse domain name hijacking.
Just a day later, here’s another case in which I question the panelist’s decision to not find reverse domain name hijacking.
KION Material Handling GmbH is a large German company that adopted the name KION in 2006. The owner of Kion.com registered the domain name in 1996.
It seems that the owner used the domain for a printing business that has closed down. Likely because it couldn’t track down the owner to try to buy the domain name, Kion filed a cybersquatting complaint.
The company knew it couldn’t prove cybersquatting under the actual rules of UDRP, so it got creative. It argued that the domain owner had relinquished its rights in the name by closing and that it was renewed in bad faith.
Panelist Nick J. Gardner did the correct thing by ruling that the domain wasn’t registered and used in bad faith. But Gardner declined to find reverse domain name hijacking on the grounds that, although KION knew its complaint shouldn’t pass UDRP muster, it at least tried to make arguments to overcome this:
The status of the Respondent is unusual and the Complainant had anticipated the difficulties that arose in its case and presented carefully reasoned arguments addressing those difficulties. Whilst the Panel has not accepted those arguments it does not consider it appropriate to make a finding of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking.
I don’t care what the status of the respondent is now, the domain was clearly not registered in bad faith so the “carefully reasoned arguments” are actually poorly reasoned arguments.
I wonder if the respondent could take both the complaintant and arbi “traitor” to a real court over the matter? Something like Nat did with his case?? Its obvious the system is bent towards helping complaintants steal what is not theirs.
In the recent previous cases featured on DomainNameWire, panelist Christopher S. Gibson seems to be RDNH-averse.
Now with this case it’s another panelist. Let’s get real here, KION is a generic 4 letter name. Just in case you missed that in capital letters KION is GENERIC! Generic, Generic, Generic!
This is something that WIPO Panelist Nick J. Gardner failed to explore or even recognize – or as a UDRP panelist he chose to ignore and sided with a case represented by IT Law, Trademarks, Domain Names specialists that had no chance of succeeding under the UDRP rules.
Nick J. Gardner sided with opportunistic domain grabbers trying to steal a march on others before they could register the domain name when it becomes free in August.
There are several registered trademarks on the USPTO as well as on other worldwide trademark registries for the term KION. There are also the many men with first name KION http://www.mybabyname.com/names/Kion and radio station KION http://www.kion546.com/ or KION Management Consulting Group http://kion.edu20.com/ or KION musical group https://www.youtube.com/user/kionandasuelto to name a few….. there are many others.
The respondent Kion Printing Inc. registered the domain name KION.com in 1996 a whole 10 years before the complainant KION Material Handling GmbH adopted the name KION in 2006.
The complainant KION Material Handling GmbH were represented by Bardehle Pagenberg Partnerschaft mbB http://www.bardehle.com/
Their fields of speciality include IT Law, Trademarks, Domain Names.
If it is true that Kion Printing Inc. has closed down then it is likely that the domain name KION.com will not be renewed when it is due to expire in a few months time on the 4th August 2017 and the domain name KION.com will become available for registration on a first come first served basis.
For a UDRP case to succeed it is necessary to prove that the domain name was registered and used in bad faith.
With this case, neither could be proved. Even the panelist Nick J. Gardner agreed with this. In this case the domain name wasn’t registered nor used in bad faith.
As lawyers specializing in IT Law, Trademarks, Domain Names, Bardehle Pagenberg Partnerschaft mbB representing KION Material Handling GmbH would have known that this case could not have succeeded yet they still took a punt on submitting this case.
In the hope of succeeding with this opportunistic UDRP case this complainant was hoping to steal a march on others being to be able to register the domain name in August. Others possibly including:
JAMI Inc. with a registered trademark for KION in 1999,
KION Corporation with a registered trademark for KION in 2001 as well as all the other with registered trademark rights in other countries and other unregistered trademark rights.
IT Law, Trademarks, Domain Names specialists would have known that their case would fail but WIPO panelist Nick J. Gardner failed to find RDNH on these. Thank you Nick J. Gardner!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!