WIPOs panelists are going soft on obvious cases of reverse domain name hijacking.
I’ve written about a few UDRP cases this week in which panelists let the complainants off the hook for reverse domain name hijacking. A decision out today for CQC.com is the worst example yet.
Clasen Quality Chocolate, Inc. of Madison, Wisconsin filed a UDRP against the three letter domain name. The domain name is owned by internet service provider Earthlink.
Earthlink got the domain name through an acquisition LINC Internet Holdings, which had previously acquired a company called ComQuest.
The chocolate company reached out to Earthlink about buying the domain name. Earthlink’s counsel verified that the company didn’t have anything connected to the domain anymore and said the company would consider offers. He noted that the company has not sold any domain for less than $100,000.
Clasen submitted a $10,000 offer. Earthlink refused.
Then Clasen demanded the domain name for $1,500 and threatened to file a UDRP if Earthlink didn’t comply.
This is an incredibly obvious case of reverse domain name hijacking. Panelist Robert A. Badgley even says that it should have never been brought. But then he lets Clasen off the hook:
The Panel will refrain from finding Reverse Domain Name Hijacking in this instance because this Complaint appears, on balance, to be more misconceived than malicious in nature.
Was the complainant misconceived? Sure. But how can you say it wasn’t malicious? It’s a textbook case of that: give me the domain for $1,500 or I’ll file a UDRP.
And Clasen was even represented by counsel at the law firm Reinhart Boerner Van Deuren.
Unbelievable.
Yes, can hardly find a more blatant example of RDNH.
Robert Badgley is fond of the formulation that complaints are “misconceived” rather than being in bad faith. This allows him to let Complainants off the hook for RDNH and enables them to escape responsibility for all the trouble and expense they cause by abusing the UDRP to attempt to steal domain names.
Movius.com
“The Panel declines to find that this misconceived Complaint was brought in bad faith, and hence the Panel makes no finding of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking.”
Robert A. Badgley
Sole Panelist
Date: November 4, 2015
http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/text/2015/d2015-1717.html
RailroadEarth.com
“the Panel concludes that this Complaint was misconceived rather than brought in bad faith, and hence the Panel declines to make a finding of reverse domain name hijacking in this case.”
Robert A. Badgley
Sole Panelist
Date: February 20, 2017
http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/search/text.jsp?case=D2017-0039
BettyLiu.com
“the Panel declines to declare that Complainant has engaged in Reverse Domain Name Highjacking. This Complaint, while misconceived and unsupported by evidence, was not brought in bad faith or for an abusive purpose.”
Robert A. Badgley
Sole Panelist
Date: March 5, 2014
http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/search/text.jsp?case=D2014-0021
This is the same Robert A. Badgley who was the Presiding Panelist in the petrofac-qatar.com UDRP.
Here is the DomainNameWire article:
This UDRP should have been reverse domain name hijacking… …yet it wasn’t even considered.
https://domainnamewire.com/2016/05/26/udrp-reverse-domain-name-hijacking/
@Nat – Excellent point
UDRP panelists need to be held responsible for their decisions. It is shameful there is no backlash for stupid decisions. In many ways I wonder if panelists are not being paid money on the side for their dumb thinking. Seriously – was Robert A. Badgley paid/compensated to make such a stupid decision? Where is he held responsible? That I am aware, he does not have to answer to anyone, just like all UDRP panelists. These panelists need to answer to someone, yet they don’t. It’s a shameful system and needs serious reform.
He was paid, of course. He knows which side his bread is buttered on, and it’s not the Respondent side.
Interesting…. not too many months back I was in communication with Earthlink, again concerning several domains CQC included.
Some years ago I bought 2 or 3 LLL.com from them.
Explains our communication.
I may add I was offering a heck of a lot more btw for their LLL (cqc included).
Their comment ” they don’t sell domains for less than 100k caught my eye 🙂 It’s great to know they know the values.
Did you get any of them?
Cheers
I bought a few LLL from them some years ago but this time was unable to work out anything, It was a package and it became complex due to not just pricing but use. Just because they no longer seem to use a domain doesn’t mean they still do not have obligations tied to it.
I think their pricing is based on a combination of market values and their time so in the end and at this moment, on the high side by a fair bit.
My offer was (honestly) above market value across the board on dozens of names just to get it done and still they were uninterested.
I even showed them the recent Namejet online Namescon auction for comparisons on the LLL com/net and that I was offering as much or more but no luck.
When you show someone you are willing to pay more than fair value and they still don’t budge you can at least walk away knowing you did your best.
For a lot of companies it’s a question of making it worth their time to go through the hassle
Very true, was the reason I stuck my neck out on a large package at or above fair value…one name at a time just isn’t doable.
End of day I didn’t get to over pay and missed a WIPO LOL
Blatant RDNH. Highly abusive. Badgley is a coward.
Meanwhile, Clasen doesn’t even rank on the first three pages of Google.com for the search phrase CQC but many other organizations do. Sad!
Perhaps Badgley himself was “misconceived”.
The problem is that Robert A. Badgley is an insurance defense attorney. The firm at which he practices, Karbal, Cohen, Economou, Silk, and Dunne, specializes in protecting insurance companies from paying out. And that end has traditionally been met via exploitation and abuse of the legal system. And that is what RDNH is. So who is surprised by Badgley’s willful refusal to find RDNH?
Any baby in a basket knows that there is no such thing on God’s trammeled earth as a ‘misconceived’ UDRP complaint. It’s 2017 and the applicable law is shorter than a dessert menu. What an embarrassing, self-incriminating assertion.
Badgley’s firm lives and feeds by bleeding opponents dry in court. Whether Karbal Law is weaseling out of paying up for a client’s liability for microwaves that burst into flame, or for two decades of wrongful imprisonment, or for carcinogens in Indiana groundwater, the modus operandi is, ‘We’re going to keep this rattling around in court for as long as humanly possible, because you can’t afford it, and no one is stopping us.’ [https://www.law360.com/articles/509959/hartford-wants-out-of-firm-s-wrongful-conviction-defense. https://www.law360.com/articles/738797/ge-defective-microwave-coverage-battle-will-stay-in-nj. https://judicialview.com/State-Cases/iowa/Insurance/Travelers-Property-Casualty-Company-of-America-v-Flexsteel-Industries-Inc./31/601947.%5D
‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.’ Whether Badgley is a good man or not is moot, because he relentlessly chooses to do nothing. The UDRP streamlines due process. The theft risk the UDRP creates, and the crushing legal fees and loss of work productivity that respondents must bear, creates a duty which is entirely lost upon Badgley. ‘Shall find RDNH’ is the mandate. If you don’t understand why, step away from the phone until you’ve read the underpinnings in the congressional record.
No one is charmed by panelists who enjoy the (compensated) opportunity to ‘natter on about this quirky, niche field of law’ (at enormous expense borne by others). And no one is charmed by panelists who insulate their ‘future clientele’ from the nasty label of ‘thief.’
The UDRP is not your unmonitored kiddie pool of legal esoterica, it is a vestibule of federal court. Where daft puling about ‘misconceived’ filings earns one a deadpan look and a 100K+ bar tab. Panelists like Badgley’s self-serving refusals to ride herd on opportunists put the UDRP at risk of becoming too full of infantile piddle to survive.
To the library of phrases like “misconceived complaint” you can add “colorable argument”.
In the DivideX.com UDRP
http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/search/text.jsp?case=D2016-2574 the domain DivideX.com was registered in 2002. Complainant registered its DIVIDEX mark 14 years later on April 19, 2016. The complainant was represented by BLA Schwartz, PC.
The complaint was denied but Lawrence K. Nodine sole panelist denied to say it was RDNH saying:
“However, Complainant presents at least a colorable argument, and its reliance on Eastman Sporto was reasonable, though Complainant has not provided convincing evidence in support of its argument. The Panel accordingly declines to find reverse domain name hijacking”.
Could someone explain what a “colorable argument” (although not supported by convincing evidence in support of its argument) is and why this means it wasn’t a case of RDNH..
This says it all,
“Badgley’s firm lives and feeds by bleeding opponents dry”
‘We’re going to keep this rattling around in court for as long as humanly possible, because you can’t afford it, and no one is stopping us.’
‘Shall find RDNH’ is the mandate.
Maybe a protest petition should be circulated and submitted when the mandate
isn’t enforced.
If I ever have to address a UDRP I think I’m just going to go straight for Fed court and skip the mafia.