The United States has taken heat of late for announcing that it intends to maintain "control" of the internet and naming systems. Many countries had hoped to loosen the U.S.'s control. So here's the question. Is it really that bad if the U.S. ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
Domain-Sucks.com isn’t international
· Policy & LawA recent WIPO panel ruling shed some new light on adding "sucks" or another derogative term to a trademark. The case is Air France and the domain AirFranceSucks.com. There are a number of reasons Air France won this case. Some of the reasons are ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
Governments to get first dibs on .travel domain names
· Domain Registrars, Policy & LawAccording to a press release today, .travel domain names will be first offered to governments to snap up country, state, and city domains. For example, the Brazilian government will be able to register Brazil.travel before other interested entities such ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
ICANN releases domain hijacking report
· Policy & LawLooking for some light bedtime reading? ICANN today released a report entitled "Domain Name Hijacking: Incidents, Threats, Risks, and Remedial Actions". It's a big topic, and ICANN made a long response to the tune of 48 pages. The reports main ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
.Net pricing timebomb?
· Policy & LawThere was a huge uproar when ICANN announced that Verisign would retain control of the .net registry a couple months ago. But there was good news--the new registry charge for .net domains would drop from $6.00 to $4.25. Some of this savings would likely ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
US to retain key internet role
· Policy & LawThe U.S. government announced that it intends to continue playing a key role in the internet by not giving complete control over to ICANN. The U.S. government will continue to maintain the root master file that controls top level domains. ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
Elephant.com prevails
· Policy & LawElephant.com Article Adam Dicker recently prevailed in a WIPO decision against the British insurer with the elephant.co.uk domain name, Admiral Insurance Services. This was clearly a case of reverse-domain hijacking by a large insurer. Dicker ... Continue Reading3 Comments
TrivialPursuits.net; a trivial domain decision
· Policy & LawTrivialPursuits.net Article In a recent WIPO decision, the owners of TrivialPursuits.net won a case brought against him by the Trivial Pursuit board game company. I can understand going after this guy if he owned TrivialPursuits.COM, but what's the ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
Anatomy of a domain name appraisal scam
· Policy & Law, Services[Update March 23, 2009: a similar scam has surfaced.] One of the oldest and most popular scams against domain name owners is the domain appraisal scam. It works like this: someone emails you interested in buying a domain. When you reply, they require ... Continue Reading39 Comments
Verisign to retain .net
· Policy & LawICANN Board Designates VeriSign to Retain Control of .NET Registry (press release) Marina del Rey, CA - - ICANN's Board has named VeriSign, Inc. as the designated .NET successor registry. ICANN has also approved entering into a new agreement with ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment