Prince.com changes hands as part of legal settlement.
The estate of late musician Prince (or whatever he was finally called) now owns the domain name Prince.com.
Domain Capital, which owned the domain name, and the estate got into a legal tussle in which the estate claimed the domain was cybersquatting and Domain Capital counter sued for reverse domain name hijacking.
The parties settled in January and there was an escrow agreement involved. This suggests that Domain Capital agreed to transfer the domain name in return for a cash payment.
As of yesterday, the domain name is at brand protection registrar Com Laude and shows that Paisley Park Enterprises, Inc. is the owner. The domain name does not resolve to a website.
Smart move and a no brainer for the estate to buy this domain. Dead singers like Jackson, Elvis or Bob Marley are raking in $20-100m each year in record sales, royalties and movie deals. Whatever they paid for it, is probably small change compared to Price’s music catalog.
Domain Capital should say the amount. There should never be NDA’s in these cases. Saying the amount the estate had to pay up would help detour future attempted domain theft .
What if the price wasn’t very high?
don’t matter. prince was high when he died. that’ what matters.
Seriously shut up! You are so disrespectful! You don’t know anything about Prince.
Very disrespectful, a stupid troll!The continued tributes almost 3 years later dismiss this nonfactor fools comment.
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/musics-fentanyl-crisis-inside-the-drug-that-killed-prince-and-tom-petty-666019/
Prince was in pain when he died. I hope someone laughs when your ass gets old and you need pain meds.
Domain theft? Prince is a common word. Hardly theft. Common words were bought early as they were seen as having a future. I suspect king, princess and queen we’re all bought early.
Yea so common that when you mention Prince most people begin to tell you whether they liked or hated him, or start singing Purple Rain. Really common.
Prince Harry just told me he is very offended by your comment!
In the 1980s, “Prince” usually referred to the musician. His was ultra famous like Madonna. By the time domains started being widely used (around 1995) he had stopped having major radio hits (even though he was still releasing a lot of music). Many younger people do not even know who he is. I am not denying his musical greatness, but it is a stretch to say he had the right to the prince.com domain. It would really depend on what the owner used the domain for. Plus, the fact that he changed his name for years, would seem to weaken his case even more.
He never legally changed his name. He even had a press conference to annouce that he was taking it back after the legal dispute with WB was over. He continued to have hits on the R n B charts and sell out arena right up to the week he died. No one gives a crap about young people because young people cannot afford $500.00 tickets which is what the tickets were going for at his last show in Oakland. The only person who does not know who he is would people living under a musical rock.
Yes, but for trademark purposes, it matters that he changed the name he was using for his business (music). It weakens the claim he has to the “Prince” name. Also, the reason it matters that most young people (under 25?) don’t know who he is, is because that also weakens the claim that the word “Prince” always refers to him. Back in the 1980s, none of that was true, it was 100% certain when people said “Prince”, everybody knew what they meant. So back then, he would have been entitled to the domain. Now it is not so clear.
If it was a settlement it likely included a non-disclosure agreement.
Most of the domain name lawyers you know prefer that settlements include non-disclosure agreements to encourage more RDNH attempts. It also allows the Hijackers to come out smelling like roses.
Late Musician Prince or whatever he was finally called? How disrespectful Andrew Allemann!! Way to be unbiased in news reporting. Prince was so much better than all of us. He never stopped teaching us, watching over us. That beautiful magical musical genius. I will miss you forever.
Clearly a sarcastic inclusion regarding a legal agreement.Prince was his legal birth name, his philanthropy, musical genius and work, will continue timeless, unlike 99% of us.That was very unprofessional and uncalled for.
The first stupid sentence threw me off from this entire article. The writer is an idiot or whatever he’s called.
Keep in mind that Prince changed his name to a symbol that could not be pronounced, as an FU to his record label (see https://www.vox.com/2016/4/21/11481686/prince-name-change-symbol-why ). So I would not say that making a comment about his name change is being disrespectful, since it was not something very serious in the first place, like if he had changed it for religious reasons.
That was over 20 years ago and he never changed his name legally. It was a slam at him because his estate has a fat load of cash and this company had no chance of winning this suit. People cannot stand the idea of the fact that Prince owned his masters and all of his publishing. He also was smart enough to trademark tons of stuff. Missed the boat on the domain name but it is back now were it belongs. Funny how the fool that wrote this does not even know that Prince along with David Bowie was one of the first artist to get his music on line and distrubte it himself with an on-line music club. You know kind of like streaming before people knew what streaming was
Um ok
Domain Capital has the money to fight it, I doubt they would roll over on this, Prince’s Estate is a money making machine with little work, all royalties, he has a huge collection of unreleased music. Yes, we hate it when people think they own generic keywords, but what is fair is fair, and Domain Capital’s ownership of this is fair play.
Indee! Just as when Madonna out bid the catholic church for Madonna.com
The estate has 30 million in royatlties coming in a milions from recent property sales. Domain Capital would not have been able to afford to fight this and whatever the estate paid for it was worth it. It will generate millons in the future and Prince’s family will benefit not some asses at some corporation who never worked at the level that Prince did in his life. Some of you are delusional
You’ve got some really strange visitors this time, Andrew…
Prince’s Estate didn’t have a good case. They rolled the dice and then they had to pay.
The Defendant’s Answer and Affirmative Defenses to the complaint says:
First Affirmative Defense
Plaintiffs’’ claims are barred because they do not have exclusive rights to the common dictionary word “Prince.”
Second Affirmative Defense
Plaintiffs’ claims are barred because Defendant’s registration and ownership of the Domain Name as a secured asset does not infringe Plaintiffs’ purported trademarks.
Third Affirmative Defense
Plaintiffs cannot prevent anyone from owning a Domain Name that is a dictionary word or commonly used word such as “Prince” or restrict others from utilizing the Domain Name in a non-infringing manner.
Eighth Affirmative Defense
Plaintiffs’ claims are barred because Prince Rogers Nelson abandoned his purported trademark rights to PRINCE.
Tenth Affirmative Defense
Plaintiffs’ claims are barred by doctrine of laches. Plaintiffs’ claims are barred by their failure to enforce the marks, over nearly a two decade period, against others that owned the Domain Name prior to 2010.
Eleventh Affirmative Defense
Plaintiffs’ claims are barred because Prince Rogers Nelson took no action to secure the Domain Name during his lifetime.
COUNTERCLAIMS:
Nature of the Action:
Plaintiffs’ claim is tantamount to a claim for exclusive rights to the word “Prince” the world over. Plaintiffs indicated in their April 30, 2018 correspondence with Domain Capital, LLC that the Prince Estate intends to pursue its claims against the domain name, Prince.com. In response to Plaintiffs’ April 30, 2018 correspondence, counsel for Domain Capital, LLC advised Plaintiffs of the inappropriate nature of their claims. Despite being placed on notice that Plaintiffs’ claims were wholly improper, that the domain name is comprised of a generic word, that there is no evidence of bad faith, infringement or dilution of Plaintiffs’ marks in any manner, Plaintiffs’ filed their Complaint and have demonstrated that they intend to maliciously use their superior financial position to hijack the domain name Prince.com from Domain Capital.
15. Reasonably relying on the truth of Counter-Claim Defendants declarations when filing,
the United States Patent and Trademark office issued US Trademark Registration Nos:
2,151,863, 5,438,807 and 5,344,001.
16. The marks asserted by counter-claim Defendants all claim rights back to 1978.
However, it is well known that Prince Rogers Nelson, abandoned the use of the stage name ‘Prince’ in 1993 and began using an unpronounceable symbol that he called the “Love Symbol,” and later referred to himself as “The Artist” and “The Artist formerly known as Prince”
instead. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_(musician)
17. Accordingly, the claims made by Counter-Claim Defendants when acquiring the marks were fraudulent and the marks must be cancelled.
26. Counter-Claim Defendants allegations are a knowing and material misrepresentation that the Prince.com domain name is a bad faith use of a valid trademark.
27. Counter-Claim Defendants’ allegations that the Prince.com domain name is identical to, confusingly similar to, or dilutive of the asserted trademarks is a knowing and material misrepresentation.
28. Counter-Claim Defendants’ allegations are directly preventing the domain name’s licensor from using the domain name to its harm.
29. The above acts by Counter-Claim Defendants constitute reverse domain name hijacking.
30. Counter-Claim Defendants’ actions have been knowing, deliberate and willful.
Did you miss that the estate now owns the name? You smucks want to take a man’s name.
Just because the estate now owns the domain in no way means they had the legal right to take it away from the previous owner. They made a settlement with Domain Capital, which most likely means they bought it.
But they got it. What you really can’t deal with is that some company made up with people who created nothing will not have the ability to capitalize on that man’s name. It is over and done.
“Justice & Truth for Prince,” are you a paid shill working on behalf of the Estate?
How much money did Comerica Bank & Trust, N.A. transfer to Domain Capital to satisfy the Escrow Agreement?
Who cares how much. Who owns it now?
My brother (RIP) who was a pop-rock singer and musical performer … he liked the lyrics of Prince (RIP) and songs Purple Rain, this of the domain names with names of dead singers and their songs, They are like the same companies, example IBM.
I remember a post that wrote that Icann give an Alert! When writing as an example: IBM if you were free to register domain and that it was a trademark.
I found free IBM TRADEMARK (.COM) and there was no ICANN alert. and there is a lot to register with two words, like prince ….
It must also be made clear that the legal problems arise because most of the companies in each country in the world do not register the extensions of their domain that exist throughout the world for 10 years as if it were their Trademark which must be renewed every 10 years.
Happy Day. Jose.