Company fails to take down a competitor’s criticism site.
It seems like every fireworks stand tries to outdo the other. “Buy 1 get 1 free” is nothing. “Buy 1 get 5 free” is more common, and I’ve even seen “Buy 1 get 20 free.”
Of course, the businesses just price the free fireworks to the total cost.
A critic and competitor to Phantom Fireworks, a company that uses the domain Fireworks.com, points this out on the criticism site PhantomFireworksScams.com. He writes, “Buy one burger for the price of two and receive a second burger absolutely free!”
Frank Elliott of Jurassic Fireworks created the site to criticize his competitor’s marketing activities and ask people to file complaints with consumer agencies. The site doesn’t mention or link to his business.
According to Phantom, Elliot promotes the site on banners hung near Phantom locations, and he “promotes the domain name by yelling and speaking through blowhorns while in close proximity to both Complainant’s customers and showroom.”
UDRP is generally not a venue to take down criticism sites, especially when the site owner is not directly profiting from the site. In this case, panelist Scott Blackmer determined that Phantom Fireworks failed to show the domain owner lacked rights or legitimate interests in the domain name. He denied the complaint but did not find this was a case of reverse domain name hijacking.
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