Legal News

How to Choose a UDRP Lawyer

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In the  Domain Investing guide section of this website, there is a short  article about domain name  lawyers. The primary purpose of the article is to share a list of attorneys who I understand to be  experts when it comes to the legal intricacies  of domain name  ownership and the rights of domain name owners. There are thousands of intellectual property lawyers, but there are far fewer lawyers who I consider specialists in the field of domain name investing.

One question I have been asked many times is how to choose a good domain industry lawyer for a UDRP defense. It’s great to have a short list of attorneys and law firms that can help with a UDRP defense case, but narrowing down that list to one attorney can be a bit of a challenge.

Having worked with several lawyers on that list for a variety of legal matters, it is difficult for me to recommend just one attorney to help defend a domain name in a UDRP proceeding. Without having experience dealing with a UDRP (thankfully), I also don’t really have much advice about choosing a lawyer for a UDRP. Other than suggesting to look through UDRPSearch.com and see some of the results of UDRP cases that are similar to  the domain name  the domain owner will have to defend, I don’t really have a great way  to help someone choose a lawyer.

That being said, I want to direct you to a long post that

Instagram Goes After Instagram.tv Domain Name

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InstagramInstagram  filed a UDRP at the World Intellectual Property Organization to get the Instagram.tv domain name. This isn’t all that surprising to me, but it is surprising that it took the company so long to go after the domain name. Instagram has filed quite a few UDRPs to take possession of typos and Instagram-related domain names.

Instagram.tv was created in January of 2011. The domain name appears to be registered to someone in China. Instagram originally launched in October of 2010, approximately three months before the Instagram.tv domain name was created.

It appears that the same registrant who owns Instagram.tv also owns Instagram.net, which was registered in November of 2010 (one month after Instagram launched). The registrant email addresses are a bit different, but it looks like it is the same registrant. Strangely, Instagram

SOG.com Subject of UDRP (Updated)

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A UDRP was filed against the valuable three letter .com domain name, SOG.com. The UDRP was filed at the National Arbitration Forum (NAF), and it is listed as case #1726464. I will be following this UDRP via UDRPSearch.com.

SOG.com is owned by a company called Poise Media Inc. that appears to be based in New York. Using DomainTools’ Historical Whois Tool, I was able to see that the registrant appears to be the same since February of 2007, meaning that it has been owned for over ten years. SOG.com  was created in April of 1996, so this domain name is over 20 years old.

SOG.com is currently monetized  with pay per click advertisements using Sedo. The domain name is also listed for sale on Sedo where it has a $40,000 minimum offer requirement. I am not sure how long the domain name has been listed for sale. SOG.com is clearly valuable, with Estibot pegging its value at $370,000. I do not see any public sales record for this domain name on NameBio.

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The NAF does not reveal the name of the complainant until the UDRP decision is published, so I do not know who filed the UDRP. The most

UDRP for Cousteau.com After Selling for $2,600 on NameJet (Update)

A UDRP was filed for the Cousteau.com domain name at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The UDRP is WIPO Case D2017-0685. I think this case will be an interesting one to follow, especially for people who participate in expired domain name auctions.

Cousteau.com has a creation date of April 12, 1995, making the domain name more than 20 years old. The domain name is currently registered to an individual, and when I visited Cousteau.com today, the domain name did not resolve. Most interestingly to me, this domain name was just won on NameJet at the end of January for $2,600, according to NameBio.

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The complainant in this UDRP is Cousteau Society, Inc.,

UDRP Filed Against Queen.com Owned by “Domain King” (Updated)

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A UDRP was filed at the World Intellectual Property Organization against the high value Queen.com domain name. The case is WIPO Case D2017-0679.

Queen.com is a domain name that is owned by Rick Schwartz, who is commonly referred to as the “Domain King.” According to an article written in 2013 on Rick’s Blog, he was able to acquire the domain name in August of 1997. Rick’s company owns a ton of great dictionary .com domain names, and the monetization and sale of some of these domain names has made him millions of dollars.

In the aforementioned  article about Rick’s purchase of Queen.com, he shared why his company acquired the domain name.  Queen.com has many different meanings. Among those meanings, and the one mentioned by Rick in his article, is adult related. As such, Queen.com is currently forwarding to an adult website, where it is likely making Rick a considerable amount of income. It seems pretty clear that buying the domain name was a good decision, as it has earned “into the 6 figures because that traffic was very valuable.”

Estibot  currently lists the value of Queen.com at $1.2 million, and I would be surprised if Rick would even consider selling the domain name at that price.

The complainant in this UDRP is listed

TNP.com Subject of UDRP Filing

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A UDRP has been filed against the high value  3 letter TNP.com domain name. The UDRP was filed at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and it is WIPO case D2017-0669 .

TNP.com was created in May of 1995, making this domain name nearly 22 years old. The domain name appears to have had Whois privacy enabled at Uniregistry until recently. Perhaps it was removed as a result of the UDRP filing.

I visited TNP.com, and I was  forwarded to a Namerific.com landing page where the domain name is listed for sale. The asking price for TNP.com is $500,000. As far as I am concerned, there is nothing wrong with selling valuable generic three letter domain names like this, and it is up to the domain name owner to set the asking price.

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According to NameBio, TNP.com last publicly sold in 2012 for $45,000. Between 2012 – 2015, three letter .com domain names increased in value considerably due to Chinese domain name investments.

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