Adrian Peterson (Asks For and) Gets AdrianPetersonOnline.com Cancelled


Asking for a domain name to be cancelled is one of the options a complainant has when filing a UDRP. Kevin S. Wiley of Gant & Hicks, PLLC, represented NFL superstar Adrian Peterson in a UDRP filing for AdrianPetersonOnline.com, and he requested a cancellation instead of requesting a transfer of the domain name.

Mr. Wiley won this uncontested dispute on behalf of Mr. Peterson (domain owner didn’t respond to the UDRP), and as requested, the panelist ordered that the domain name is to be cancelled.

I am not experienced in legal matters, but I don’t understand why an attorney would choose to request a cancellation in lieu of a transfer. If the domain name is transferred to the complainant, it would be the complainant’s responsibility to renew the domain name annually, and the complainant may have no desire to pay for an annual renewal on a domain name he doesn’t want. That is the primary reason I can think of for a cancellation.

With a cancelled domain name though, it is my understanding that the domain name will eventually be available for someone else to renew. Since AdrianPetersonOnline.com was (and still is for the time being) an operational website about Adrian Peterson, it’s likely a new registrant will purchase this domain name either in a drop auction or after it’s gone through the expiration cycle. This could cause Mr. Peterson and his representatives to have to go through the UDRP process again, which of course would likely be more expensive than renewing the name for the next 100 years.

Of course I might be missing something here with respect to a cancellation, and I would be interested in hearing why a cancellation request could be a good idea.

(Image above is screenshot from AdrianPetersonOnline.com).

Elliot Silver
Elliot Silver
About The Author: Elliot Silver is an Internet entrepreneur and publisher of DomainInvesting.com. Elliot is also the founder and President of Top Notch Domains, LLC, a company that has closed eight figures in deals. Please read the DomainInvesting.com Terms of Use page for additional information about the publisher, website comment policy, disclosures, and conflicts of interest. Reach out to Elliot: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn

18 COMMENTS

  1. Not sure why the complainant’s lawyers would request this, but when I received my forst and only C&D letter years ago, I cancelled the domain rather than handing it over.

    My reasoning was exactly what you suggest in your post, that somebody else would pick up the name in a drop and then the complainant would have to go through the whole process again.

  2. Nothing related to this particular case, but in some cases it could be used to cover up a RDNH attempt as in the SaveMe.com action where the company asks that the domain name “get cancelled to avoid further confusion”. The complainant can then go out and place backorders at different providers to take a shot once the domain drops.

  3. @ Abdu

    I don’t see how it would make any sense in that scenario you mentioned. If a company thinks it has rights to the domain name, why would they ever want it cancelled so they could spend money trying to buy it when they could just as easily request that it be transferred. If they win a UDRP, they would get the name rather than having to fight to get it. I don’t follow that logic.

  4. This does bring to light to all those out there who buy up high school and college player names and try to hide behind the “Fan” website “we’re not affiliate with” argument. People that try to argue it in their favor are clueless and here is another example of them being in the wrong. Nice post.

  5. @Elliot

    The example I mentioned was for domains that the company would be attempting RDNH. As in the case of SaveMe.com, they tried to buy it from Schwartz but failed to reach an agreement. By attempting to hijack a domain through a UDRP action, and by asking the panel to delete the domain, they’ll try to pretend that the domain is no of much importance and that they’d rather have the domain deleted to avoid confusion, where in fact they really want the domain.

  6. @ Abdu

    That makes little sense to me. If it was important enough to file a UDRP, it doesn’t make sense to cancel it in their case since they have a brand and would have to go after it again.

  7. “I called the attorney to ask and left him a message. I’ll follow up if he returns my call.”

    In addition to talking to the attorney (if he gets back to you) I would check with the domain owner/agent. Perhaps they aren’t aware of how this actually works (with a domain being able to be grabbed again).

    It is possible that the attorney isn’t experience enough to know what “cancellation” means.

    It is also possible that this is a way for them to charge additional legal fees to their client when the name gets grabbed again. And of course the client not knowing this business will not know how easy that would have been to prevent by getting a transfer.

  8. Who knows. It doesn’t make sense. My thoughts are that they would think that before someone would buy it they saw the history of what happened and it would deter them from spending the resources to build it out. Or it could just be his attorney milking him so that he could represent him in the future again.

  9. What perplexes me the most is that aren’t Fansites protected? It just seems unusual to me considering the amount of fansites out there of famous celebrities that don’t get taken down. Could it be because it had been monetized?

    It’s really unfortunate because it could be argued that sites like this really give him a lot of support and only further his brand recognition. It’s sad when celebrities take down sites of people who only want to support them, especially when it’s younger fans who don’t mean anything bad by it.

  10. IMHO, Adrian Peterson has never been that good of a player. He fumbles too often. His total yards mean little when he fumbles with the game on the line. IMO, The Viking will never be contenders. Maybe Peterson is a bitter professional athlete.

    There is also a disclaimer on the top portion of the website that informs the reader that this is a fan site not affiliated with the Viking and Adrian Peterson.

    Never liked Adrian Peterson much. Seems like he dropped the ball again on this UDRP.

  11. The only time we ever would ask for a cancellation is if there’s another TM in the domain, and we don’t want to touch it because it’s in a way, a double infringement.

    Usually, you wouldn’t UDRP one domain by itself with that end goal, I wouldn’t think.

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