I was looking through the WIPO UDRP filings and saw a UDRP filed against a seemingly generic Costa.com domain name. The UDRP was filed by the company that operates Costa Cruises. While UDRPs going after generic (and valuable) domain names are a relatively rare occurrence, it is still a bit disappointing to see them.
That being said, the cruise company could have a better shot to win this UDRP than other companies have when going after descriptive domain names like this one appears to be. When I visited the domain name yesterday and today, I saw PPC links related to cruises. I can see why Costa Cruises would be upset about the domain name. Depending on the details that will be revealed in the UDRP responses, this could be a tough UDRP to defend.
Domain owners should be cautious when using parked pages. A domain name may be generic in nature, but if PPC links infringe on another entity’s trademarks, it could be problematic for the domain owner. For instance, a domain owner could easily and defensible own Apples.com if it was selling apples or advertising a pick your own apple orchard. What likely would be harder to defend is a PPC lander with links to phones and computers.
PPC technology is pretty good. Parking company tech can show advertising it believes is relevant based on the keywords. Sometimes this doesn’t consider trademark implications, which is obviously something a domain owner should consider. When auto-generated PPC links optimize revenue, they may expose the domain name and domain owner to a legal threat.
For today’s poll, I would like to know if domain owners check all of their PPC pages, none of their PPC pages, or only their pages they believe could be a grey area for trademark issues. If you do something else, that would be interesting to know in the comment section:
Looks like it’s a default registrar ppc lander, similar to that of NetworkSolutions. Makes it even worse. The poor guy probably didn’t even know until he got with the UDRP. Those registrar ppc landing pages are really only benefitting the registrar. Registrar default landers should NEVER show ads! These idiots ard risking property of clients worth in the 6 figures for a couple of bucks in ad revenues…
DTV.com a great example. Check your landing page.
Domains I would never trust to PPC landers, I now use keyword locking at Uniregistry. So far, so good.
Parking with ads a name like COSTA.com is not only stupid, it’s “suicidal”.
In this case it’s not even a default landing page, the domain is registered at eNom and parked with SmartName … so it was parked on purpose …
Aside from the fact that there are many other companies with a word TM on the generic term “Costa” (which means “Coast” in Spanish, Portuguese and Italian) in other Nice classes, some predating the domain registration, Costa Crociere, now owned by Carnival Corp., has been well-known worldwide well before 1997, when the domain was originally registered.
Costa Crociere has no TM before 1998, but the term “Costa” was well-know referring to the company well before that date, even going back decades.
IMHO we surely have bad faith in use here, as regards bad faith in registration it has to be seen if/how the panelist/s will consider the notoriety of the term “Costa” in the cruising business and the generic nature of the name involved.
The Japanese domain owner is playing with fire here IMHO … 🙂
Is PPC still a thing? 🙂
I think I stopped using PPC like 6 years ago??
Sometimes people park domains without realizing they have PPC ads active…
It’s not worth loosing a valuable domain over pennies.
Harm has occured, when people want product or service for free; nothing much and nothing less…
No ads on my landers. Maybe an optional answer to your poll could be I wouldn’t use ppc on any of my landers.
TY Andrea for the info you provided. Also in the tab for costa.com you can see the keywords costa/cruise/cruise line. I hope this guy loses, though i love to see reverse domain name hijacking decisions