Founder’s Reddit post hurt its case, but it would have lost anyway.
A World Intellectual Property Organization panel has found Leancode, Inc., maker of the Plugable (misspelling of Pluggable) brand of docking stations, guilty of reverse domain name hijacking.
Richard Harrison acquired the domain pluggable.com (correct spelling of the word) in February 2009. He used it for his business, Pluggable Ltd, which he shut down in 2012.
Earlier this year, he reactivated email services for the domain name and found he was receiving email meant for the complainant. He reached out to the complainant and offered to sell the domain. The parties didn’t come to terms.
The maker of docking stations didn’t obtain trademark rights until after Harrison acquired the domain. In its dispute, the company acknowledged that the domain was registered before it had rights, but argued that the relevant date was 2026, when the domain was reactivated.
This obviously didn’t fly with the panel, which unanimously rejected the case (pdf).
It didn’t help that last year, the founder of the complainant wrote on Reddit:
Yes! It’s the classic issue of name clash and branding. We’re Plugable because the dictionary word pluggable.com wasn’t available, and can’t be trademarked!
The three-member panel found reverse domain name hijacking, stating that the case had no reasonable prospect of success and should never have been filed.
It pointed out that the domain was registered before the complainant obtained trademark rights and that the complainant was aware that pluggable is a dictionary term (referring to the Reddit post).
Eligon IP LLC represented the complainant. Adlex Solicitors represented the domain owner.
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