[HN Gopher] Ask HN: Own .com for 7 years, a new company trademar...
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Ask HN: Own .com for 7 years, a new company trademarked my name
registered .NET
I have owned a .com for 7+ years, a new company who has only been
around for <2 years registered the .net 2 years ago and now
threaten for me to handover my .com or they will sue I have
received a cease and desist letter from a law firm via email. They
claim as they client registered a trademark two years ago for the
name, I must handover my .com domain to them for free, otherwise
they will sue me. For them not to sue me, because they have now
registered trademark (even though I had the .com domain and was
using it 7+ years before them) They state from their solicitor
that I must do all the following (long letter they sent me but here
is the title/headings): 1. Cessation of Use of the
Mark. 2. Abandonment of Rights 3. Future Trademark
Applications 4. Transfer of Domain Names 5.
Acknowledgement of Ownership and No Challenge 6. Mutual
Release 7. Covenant Not to Sue 8. No Outstanding or
Known Future Claims/Causes of Action 9. Acknowledgment of
Settlement 10. Confidentiality of Agreement 11. Non-
Disparagement 12. Agreement is Legally Binding 13.
Entire Agreement 14. New or Different Facts: No Effect
15. Interpretation 16. Governing Law and Submission to
Jurisdiction 17. Equitable Relief 18. Reliance on Own
Counsel 19. Counterparts 20. Authority to Execute
Agreement They sent this just email today, but state that I
must do all of this within 3 days. "[Company Name]
further demands that you provide, by no later than the close of
business Pacific Standard Time on December 15, 2021, written
confirmation that you will comply with these demands. You are
specifically advised that any failure or delay in complying with
these demands will likely compound the damages for which you may be
liable. If [Company Name] does not receive a satisfactory and
timely response, [Company Name] is prepared to take all steps
necessary to protect [Company Name]'s valuable intellectual
property rights, without further notice to you. The
above is not an exhaustive statement of all the relevant facts and
law. [Company Name] expressly reserves all of its legal
and equitable rights and remedies, including the right to seek
injunctive relief and recover monetary damages." Is this
correct? Sounds ridiculous to me. If anything I would have thought
they should be the ones changing their name, as I was using the
name 7+ years before them with a similar product
Author : brogrammer2018
Score : 325 points
Date : 2021-12-11 15:53 UTC (7 hours ago)
| DaveExeter wrote:
| >Is this correct? Sounds ridiculous to me.
|
| It is ridiculous, and the only reason for this is because they
| have no legal right to the domain name.
| WORMS_EAT_WORMS wrote:
| Congratulations! You just got an offer for a buy out.
|
| This could be the best thing that has ever happened to you.
| Depending on the price and size here, very little chance / or
| unlucky for them to go nuclear option. The last thing they want
| to do is take this to court and then also lose. Devastating for
| them to lose and only expensive for you to lose.
|
| Settle here and take the bonus.
|
| How deep do their pockets look and how valuable is this domain to
| them / you?
|
| 0. Get lawyer and do everything through them and through their
| advice first.
|
| 1. Draft a response saying basically over your dead body, make it
| clear and obvious how likely it is they will lose, and tell them
| you are prepared to take this to courts for a legal judgment.
|
| Tell them you are reasonable though and give them an option to
| make a serious offer for purchase at 10x whatever you value it
| at.
|
| 2a. Get offer, negotiate to a value of 0.25-4x (not 10x), accept,
| move on with your life.
|
| 2b. Get sued, win, re-offer sale at 20x. Sell domain at 8-12x.
|
| 2c. Get sued, lose, sucks.
| notahacker wrote:
| I'd check the specifics of this _very_ carefully with a domain
| specialist lawyer before making a counter offer, especially one
| involving setting a large price.
|
| One way to make a very weak case that an already-registered
| domain is being used in "bad faith" against a trademarked
| entity a bit stronger is to argue that the owner of the domain
| made an unsolicited request to the trademark holder for
| payment...
| WORMS_EAT_WORMS wrote:
| Yes. Exactly (step 0). Anything will be used against you
| otterley wrote:
| Every answer in this thread is wrong except for "hire an attorney
| and work with them to figure out what the best option for you
| is." Do not follow any "free legal advice" from HN -- and I'm
| speaking as an actual licensed attorney.
| jevoten wrote:
| You act like getting informed on the law is somehow contrary to
| hiring a lawyer, which is especially bizarre, since most of the
| advice was phrased as "in my experience X is likely to happen,
| but you should consult with a lawyer".
|
| Is it wrong to try to be informed of the law (when ignorance is
| rarely an excuse)? To find out what rights a trademark or a
| domain name confer? Or to list precedent and examples, such as
| nissan.com? We should just stick our heads in the sand, resign
| ourselves to total ignorance and helplessness, and let the
| lawyers do all the thinking?
|
| Lets make this specific. Look at this comment:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29522196
|
| Are you saying every part of that comment, except for "This is
| probably not DIY territory; consult a lawyer knowledgable about
| trademark law to help you determine how to respond." is
| _wrong_?
|
| For example, is the following statement _wrong_ in the U.S.?
|
| > Just like patents have a concept of "prior art," trademarks
| have a concept of "first use in commerce."
| oauea wrote:
| > and I'm speaking as an actual licensed attorney.
|
| and so the racket continues
| jacoblambda wrote:
| This is the equivalent of a doctor saying "if you think you
| have cancer, don't blindly listen to the internet and consult
| a doctor and I say that as a licensed medical professional".
|
| This isn't someone trying to rope someone into a racket for
| their own gain, it's "Our laws and legal system are a
| clusterfuck that varies wildly from region to region. Get a
| free (or at least cheap) consult instead of taking a risk
| trying to navigate this yourself".
|
| There is no situation in which it is worthwhile to take the
| risk to try and navigate that clusterfuck yourself. Spend the
| 50USD or so and the hour of your time it'll cost at most to
| get a consult and go from there. At best you can get
| something out of this whole interaction but at worst if you
| don't consult a lawyer you can end up without the domain,
| without any money from selling the domain, and saddled with
| legal fees defending a lawsuit against you.
| will4274 wrote:
| Except that it isn't cancer. It's a headache. And sure,
| WebMD will tell you to call a doctor in case your headache
| is a blood clot. But most people just take aspirin.
| codingdave wrote:
| Exactly. Licensed attorney's typically avoid any commentary
| at all that could be construed as advice, to avoid creating a
| relationship. So if someone is sticking their neck out, it is
| hard to imagine there isn't an ulterior motive in telling
| everyone to lawyer up when they get a letter.
|
| Not that their advice is wrong - you should consult a lawyer
| over internet advice. But the "everyone else is wrong, listen
| to me" flavor is a bit heavy-handed.
| otterley wrote:
| I'm being heavy-handed here because 20 years ago, before I
| was a lawyer, I was sued, failed to hire counsel in time,
| and unnecessarily lost my shirt as a result. I don't want
| the same thing to happen to OP.
|
| Legal questions come up on HN from time to time and the
| usual response is a bunch of wannabe lawyers incorrecting
| one another, and if OP follows any of their advice, Bad
| Things could result. I spoke up early this time in what was
| perhaps a foolish attempt to short-circuit this.
|
| No competent attorney is going to give legal advice here --
| money aside -- because they would be violating their
| professional ethics code by doing so. Giving legal advice
| requires knowing facts at a very detailed level (the degree
| to which is rarely found in the post), knowing the laws in
| the jurisdiction(s), and having relationships and
| experience. Not to mention attorney-client confidentiality,
| and other reasons.
| sdoering wrote:
| Thanks for being a voice of reason.
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| Whether or not you, or anyone else, believes, and / or can
| demonstrate, the current state of society and legal systems
| is a racket, doesn't magic away the problem of a potential
| default judgement.
| ArtTimeInvestor wrote:
| Bullshit.
|
| Knowing your rights, reading the law and discussing it is a
| perfectly fine thing to do for everybody.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Knowing your rights, reading the law and discussing it is a
| perfectly fine thing to do for everybody.
|
| Sure. I am a former law student (in mid career when I did
| that), worked in legislative office, spent a large part of my
| career as a government program analyst that did lots of
| legal/compliance analysis, and spend huge amounts of reading
| and discussing the law, legal rights, etc.
|
| But when people have an immediate concrete legal problem with
| substantial property or other interests at stake, whatever
| other discussion of my understanding of the involved law
| involved might be interesting, the only correct _advice_ in
| ~99.997% [0] of circumstances from anyone who is not a
| lawyer, or even just not the person involved's lawyer on the
| matter, is to get someone who is _your_ lawyer (at least for
| the length of a consultation) review and advise.
|
| [0] there are situations where the practical context is such
| that the law and legal advice are irrelevant, though they are
| quite exceptional.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Every answer in this thread is wrong except for "hire an
| attorney and work with them to figure out what the best option
| for you is." Do not follow any "free legal advice" from HN --
| and I'm speaking as an actual licensed attorney.
|
| Speaking as a former law student that left because I got back
| into technology, and who is a fairly educated layman on the law
| but _not_ someone with any financial interest in how people
| approach legal services, this.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Can't up vote this enough.
|
| 1) This is an ex co-worker . I believe she's well versed in
| such things. I get nothing for this mention.
|
| https://kinneyfirm.com/
|
| 2) That said, one of the keys to trademark is being in the same
| industry, such that the public might get confused.
|
| Apple Computer striking a deal with Apple Records, once the
| former started to sell music, is a good example. Prior to that,
| there was no (legal or market) overlap of the two.
| daveevad wrote:
| One thing I noticed during the Get Back Beatles Documentary
| recently released, is that Apple Records was a subsidiary of
| Apple Corps. The Beatles' Apple had much bolder ambitions
| than I had realized. In the film, they discussed movies and
| performances under the Apple umbrella.
|
| John Lennon himself described it as: "we've got this thing
| called 'Apple' which is going to be records, films, and
| electronics - which all tie up."
| mlyle wrote:
| > 2) That said, one of the keys to trademark is being in the
| same industry, such that the public might get confused.
|
| Note that this is generally true for trademark law, but there
| are things like the ICANN/WIPO UDRP that can be used to
| expropriate domain names that have somewhat of a different
| standard.
| zoe4883 wrote:
| This sort of looks like template document. An actual attorney
| would send paper letter, not an email.
| otterley wrote:
| False. C&D letters are sent via email all the time.
| hedora wrote:
| This is a great reason to ensure your mail client doesn't
| auto-download embedded images, send read receipts, etc.
|
| No reason to tip your hand until a lawyer tells you to. For
| instance, the last time I dealt with a lawyer, they had me
| send responses directly, in hopes the other side would
| underestimate our position. It worked, fwiw.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _False. C &D letters are sent via email all the time._
|
| Millions of Americans don't have e-mail. They're just on
| social media. What then?
|
| That's why important things are always sent by mail. Very
| important things by certified mail.
| otterley wrote:
| That's irrelevant for this issue. Domain holders have to
| provide working email addresses as a condition of
| registration, and are reminded annually to keep their
| addresses up to date.
|
| If an email address can't be found, the correspondence
| can be delivered through other means if necessary (mail,
| process server, etc.). But generally, there has no longer
| been a need to waste paper and postage to deliver notices
| since email became practically ubiquitous.
| m3047 wrote:
| IANAL but I am an internet plumber. Happy to provide
| expert witness that e.g. Hover, owned by Tucows, has a
| toggle for whois in their domain admin dashboard but it
| does nothing: I cannot turn whois on even if I want to.
|
| Having, or publishing, an email address does not mean I
| care to, choose to, or will in fact receive email sent by
| you; or that I will display or treat it in the fashion
| you desire.
| zrobotics wrote:
| They may not check their email, but how is anyone on
| social media without email? I'm not aware of a single
| social site that doesn't require an email address to
| create an account.
| otterley wrote:
| I believe all of them allow the use of a mobile phone
| number as an alternative.
| rfrey wrote:
| Person who charges $600/hour: "your only correct action is to
| hire a person who charges $600/hour."
|
| Sorry for the snarkiness, but I'm continuously gobsmacked by
| how oblivious people, especially attorneys, can be to the fact
| that the Game of Justice as it is played in these parts is
| simply not accessible to the vast majority of people, who can
| only try to find another way to work around the system even if
| it's probably doomed to failure.
| jksmith wrote:
| Agree, just got a TM, and the journey was full of grey areas
| and few to zero xor solutions. For all the lawyer haters, the
| game is already rigged, so don't hate the player.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| laurent123456 wrote:
| I don't know what's so special about law that it can never been
| discussed in any forum. You can certainly ask about other
| people's previous experience, possible advice or
| recommendations. For example for certain legal issues there are
| government websites that can help, etc. Saying "hire an
| attorney", as if it was no big deal to directly spend thousands
| without first asking around, is a bit strange.
| zbuf wrote:
| It also incorrectly assumes the purpose of a forum (this and
| many others) is to simply find the answer to the person's
| question.
|
| For as long as people enjoy reading, writing and discussing,
| the only important thing is that readers can distinguish
| between "legal advice" and something some random person said
| on the internet.
| kingcharles wrote:
| I've litigated dozens of cases on my own. Law isn't that
| complicated, especially for the smart people on here. You can
| often do a better job on your own simply because you have
| waaay more time to spend on the issue than a lawyer would.
| Plus you have skin in the game which makes you motivated in a
| way your lawyer will never be.
|
| The flip side to that is that it is illegal in most states to
| give legal advice to someone unless you are a lawyer. You can
| give legal information, but not advice.
|
| [Illinois once tried to prosecute me for the crime, so I have
| some experience]
| moksly wrote:
| The advice sort of extends to any profession doesn't it?
| Sometimes you can get good advice from strangers on social
| media, most times you probably shouldn't risk anything on it
| though.
|
| It's sort of like Google programming isn't it? I'm sure
| you'll get it to work, but you hopefully wouldn't do it if
| you were building medical software that could end up killing
| people. That's when you pay the experts.
| rvba wrote:
| People tell to hire a lawyer, yet at same time hundreds of
| programmers copy snippets of code they dont understand, or use
| libraries unaudited by anyone
| ISL wrote:
| Sometimes doing so yields an RCE, dealing substantial damage
| to both a company and its counterparties.
| throwaway2048 wrote:
| That says more about the profession of "Programmer" vs
| "Lawyer" than it does about some imagined hypocrisy.
| ransom1538 wrote:
| Do not respond to the letter. Do not engage. Do not alter your
| website. Do not hire a lawyer. The fastest way to enter into a
| legal battle is to hire an attorney and start engaging.
| dtech wrote:
| Seems like an excellent way to lose your domain in a default
| judgement
| ransom1538 wrote:
| "Strictly speaking, a cease and desist letter is not
| legally binding because the recipient can choose to ignore
| it. However, it is a valid legal document that establishes
| a precedent of a plaintiff's grievance. Usually, the letter
| sets a time limit for the recipient to comply with the
| request to desist from the offending action -- or deliver
| an appropriate response if they believe the letter was sent
| in error."
|
| Take the letter. Delete it. Engaging is the fastest way to
| lose the domain. Their Lawyers _want_ you to engage and
| start making written statements. Don 't.
|
| "Seems like an excellent way to lose your domain in a
| default judgement"
|
| Lol. Don't ignore legal paperwork or court dates, which
| this isn't.
| otterley wrote:
| This is not legal advice, but I don't recommend waiting
| until a suit is filed. Hiring counsel early and figuring
| out how to respond to the initial notice can be
| important: it might keep the courts out of the dispute
| altogether (especially if the other side is on very weak
| grounds) and might increase the settlement amount (if
| any) should OP choose to settle and transfer the domain.
|
| There's more to this issue than just the naked law and
| legal procedure. Context matters, and experienced lawyers
| help you navigate _situations._ They 're called "counsel"
| for a reason. :-)
| ransom1538 wrote:
| Reminds me of my favorite lawyer youtube video:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgWHrkDX35o
| Ancapistani wrote:
| A default judgement requires that a case be filed. In the
| US, that means they have to serve you notice of the case.
|
| Obviously they have the OP's address, so if they fail to
| serve him the judgement should be easy enough to set aside.
|
| I'd do absolutely nothing in this circumstance until and
| unless they actually initiate a legal proceeding. If they
| _did_ sue for the domain, depending on the value of brand I
| probably lawyer up, and perhaps seriously consider counter-
| suing them for both their domain and the use of the
| business name itself.
| [deleted]
| prepend wrote:
| I don't question your motives in this instance, but I always
| pay extra attention when someone's advice is to hire them or
| someone like them.
|
| Obviously, "hire a lawyer," is sometimes right. But if I hired
| a lawyer every time I was told to, I would be out hundreds of
| hours of billing fees. Anecdotally, I've never fucked anything
| up royally. That doesn't mean that I made the right decision,
| but is something I strive for.
|
| Spending $300-1000 on a consult every time I might need one is
| like taking an antibiotic every time I might have encountered a
| bacteria. It's important to qualify and spend money when I
| actually need to rather than every time.
|
| It's like those people who say "don't criticize my book until
| you read it" (since that usually means that it makes them some
| money to have me buy their book). If I had to read every book
| to figure out if I should like it or not, that's impossible. I
| need to develop effective evaluations and filters to prevent me
| from wasting my time and money.
| otterley wrote:
| I have no skin in this game. I just have experience.
|
| The outcome here could be that OP loses their domain name. If
| they just want to give it up, they don't have to hire an
| attorney. Easy answer.
|
| But if they do want to keep the domain name, when paid
| opposing counsel comes knocking at the door, they need to
| lawyer up, plain and simple.
| gitfan86 wrote:
| It isn't that simple. The burden of proof and the cost of
| filing suit is entirely on the people who own the .net
| domain. You can't lose a domain based off of a threatening
| email.
|
| I have received threaten letters before and have responded
| with "I dispute these claims. Please do not contact me
| again in any manner" and I never heard from them again.
|
| I don't know enough about the company sending the
| threatening letter here, so I can't say if that would work
| or not here, but it is very possible you don't need a
| lawyer.
| otterley wrote:
| > You can't lose a domain based off of a threatening
| email.
|
| Indeed, but if you take no action at all, the opposing
| counsel _does_ take action, and you don 't contest the
| action, then the default outcome could be a forced
| transfer of the domain.
| gitfan86 wrote:
| So you agree that he doesn't need a lawyer at this
| junction. But if a lawsuit is filled, he will need to
| respond and request that the case be dismissed. Using a
| lawyer for that step isn't a bad idea.
|
| They are going to have a hard time finding a case that
| set a precedent that you can take over another company's
| website because you registered a similar company 5 years
| later. Lookup nissan.com
| otterley wrote:
| This is not legal advice, but I don't recommend waiting
| until a suit is filed. Hiring counsel early and figuring
| out how to respond to the initial notice can be
| important: it might keep the courts out of the dispute
| altogether (especially if the other side is on very weak
| grounds) and might increase the settlement amount (if
| any) should OP choose to settle and transfer the domain.
|
| There's more to this issue than just the naked law and
| legal procedure. Context matters, and experienced lawyers
| help you navigate _situations_. They 're called "counsel"
| for a reason. :-)
| gitfan86 wrote:
| But at what cost? 200/hour to navigate a situation that
| is easily winnable? Also if the other party knows that he
| has a lawyer they can use that to run up legal fees,
| making a settlement seem like the cheaper option.
| otterley wrote:
| You are assuming "easily winnable" without knowledge of
| all the facts and the law. The _whole reason_ to hire an
| attorney is to get an informed opinion about where you
| stand in the first place.
| gitfan86 wrote:
| You are assuming that one cannot access facts and the law
| without paying a lawyer.
| cyral wrote:
| Even if they want to give it up, the agreement will likely
| have representations and warranties (see part about any
| known/future claims) which OP should not just sign without
| an attorney reading it over. The agreement will surely be
| written in a way that is very favorable to the other party.
| user3939382 wrote:
| > Spending $300-1000 on a consult every time I might need one
|
| Actually I've been surprised to find that many times even
| high priced attorneys are usually willing to spend 20-30
| minutes+ giving you some general advice before even retaining
| them. I've gotten very valuable advice this way several times
| at no cost.
| uberman wrote:
| This is my personal experience as well.
| devoutsalsa wrote:
| They need to due a little due diligence before taking you
| in as a client, such as assessing if your needs fall
| within their expertise and whether you will be a
| potentially profitable client. If you work as hard as you
| can to summarize your case to respect their time, as
| opposed to rambling like an incoherent crazy person, you
| can often get a free pointer on how to handle the case &
| maybe a referral to someone who is better prepared to
| assist you.
| spockz wrote:
| Usually you have something like insurance for this. In Dutch
| it is called "rechtsbijstand" for private persons and pretty
| affordable. These are not necessarily the best lawyers
| obviously but they are backed by huge law firms. Probably the
| same exists for businesses but way more expensive.
|
| So it doesn't need to be expensive to request the support of
| a lawyer.
| mosselman wrote:
| "Rechtsbijstand" is dependent on certain conditions.
| Amongst which a minimum amount of financial damage.
|
| The "juridisch loket" is an organisation that provides free
| legal advice and is financed by the Dutch government. This
| is probably a better option in most cases.
| nicbou wrote:
| In my experience, a lawyer will also nudge you towards
| whichever course involves keeping a lawyer involved. They'll
| never tell you "if I were in your shoes, I wouldn't keep
| going".
| wayoutthere wrote:
| They will, because they don't want to pursue legal action
| where there's little chance of them getting paid. It's
| worth giving you a half-hour of their time for free to
| figure out if 1) there's enough money involved, 2) the
| defendant can pay up in the event of a win or 3) you can
| pay up if you don't win. Nothing worse than working 100
| hours and not being able to collect because the defendant
| is "judgment-proof" (aka flat broke).
|
| Have a home issue where the builder owes me $100k in an
| open-and-shut case... but there are a dozen other people in
| the same situation, his company has folded and he's under
| indictment for fraud in an unrelated case. My lawyer
| advised me to just move on with my life as any chance of
| collecting is near-zero.
| ISL wrote:
| It is essential to ask around for recommendations -- there
| are some great lawyers out there. When you need a good one,
| you may find yourself suddenly-surprised and grateful to be
| paying their (substantial) hourly rate.
| maccard wrote:
| Ive had three legal advice experiences - two with work and
| one personal. The employer ones were both straightforward
| about whether or not we should do something, and they did
| not encourage us to keep returning to them on the issue,
| and the personal one the guy gave me a 30 minute phone
| call, advised me that if I wanted to formally pursue the
| matter I would need to engage his services at PS200/hour,
| however his unofficial legal advice was to just proceed and
| not bother.
|
| As another anecdote, my experience with developers is that
| developers will repeatedly tell you that the software isn't
| complete and requires extra attention to keep it running
| and to maintain it, and that it needs extra time for
| refactoring, despite it functioning correctly right now...
| scrose wrote:
| > my experience with developers is that developers will
| repeatedly tell you that the software isn't complete and
| requires extra attention to keep it running and to
| maintain it
|
| Is that not true in most cases? A running system will
| eventually become vulnerable to attacks, and/or services
| it relies on may be deprecated. The last thing you want
| is to be in a situation where your software is easily
| exploitable, but your dependencies are so far behind that
| a fix becomes a multi-month or year long project.
| pxx wrote:
| Since your comment is categorical, I'd like to chime in
| with a counterexample. I've gone in for a consult and
| gotten "you've already pretty much done everything I would.
| I can charge you $2000 for the rest but you probably
| wouldn't want to do this seeing that you already have done
| all of the work."
| kingcharles wrote:
| 99% of the lawyers I've met are scum, and I've met
| hundreds.
|
| One lawyer I hired to defend me in a contractual pay
| dispute said to me on the first meeting with both sides "Do
| not let this get to court. If this goes to court the only
| people that will win are me and the other lawyer. We'll
| both get to take an extra vacation this year." So, 1% of
| lawyers are not scum.
|
| Luckily it didn't need to go to court. I walked into the
| meeting, let the other side play hardball, "We're not going
| to pay you any of the money we owe you, go fuck yourself."
| and then showed them in the contract they had signed where
| it says they don't own any of the copyright to any of the
| work I developed for them. They left the room and came back
| several minutes later with a cheque.
| winterplace wrote:
| Which one was it and how did you find that person?
| kingcharles wrote:
| I can't remember his name, this was circa 2004 in the UK
| (so technically a "solicitor" not a lawyer). I found him
| on a referral from an acquaintance.
| nrook wrote:
| My experience differs. I once had a legal dispute in which
| I was asked to sign away some additional rights in order to
| receive some money that I was owed anyway. My lawyer said,
| essentially, "you are in the right, but you aren't planning
| on using those rights anyway, so just sign the paper and
| get this over with."
|
| There are scrupulous and unscrupulous lawyers, much as in
| any profession.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > My lawyer said, essentially, "you are in the right, but
| you aren't planning on using those rights anyway, so just
| sign the paper and get this over with."
|
| There are situations where this is _very good_ legal
| advice. Collecting things you are owed from people who
| don 't want to give them up takes time and money (and
| involves risk), and even when it nominally works the
| systems intended to make you whole for the additional
| costs don't always, and especially often don't value time
| (both delay and the consumption of your personal time) as
| much as you do.
|
| A lawyer's job isn't just to advise you on what the law
| says you are entitled to, but more critically to do so on
| the course of action that will best achieve your
| interests given the pragmatics of the legal system.
| devoutsalsa wrote:
| A bad lawyer will never help you get to the point, because
| a bad lawyer needs to milk you as they have little to no
| referral business.
|
| I got a semi-serious traffic ticket in Colorado in 2014,
| but I lived in California. I forgot about the ticket, and
| remembered a couple years later. I wanted to clear up the
| situation, but navigating the court system from a different
| state was challenging. I decided hiring an attorney local
| to the area would be easier than traveling to Colorado.
|
| I called maybe 6 to 8 attorneys, and they fell into three
| categories: too expensive, too inexperienced, or just
| right.
|
| Too expensive sounded like "we'll need a $2000 retainer to
| even look at your case."
|
| Too inexperienced sounded like "I just graduated from law
| school, and I'll give you a super good rate for the
| experience of working on your case."
|
| Just right sounded like "I know the district attorney who
| is overseeing your case. Their name is $NAME, and here's
| exactly how I'm going to handle your case... <time passes>
| ...I might be able to handle this for $500, but it could
| cost maybe double that if it's more work than expected."
|
| I got the matter resolved for between 1X and 2X the minimum
| estimate, and was happy with the results.
| winterplace wrote:
| What did you use to look them up?
| otterley wrote:
| I'm sorry you had such an experience. Ethical lawyers will
| give you the best advice they can, which often includes
| "you are going to end up paying me way more than what's at
| stake here." (This literally just happened to me as a
| client over a land-sale-deposit dispute.) Or, "This is a
| turkey of a case and you should roll over. You owe me
| nothing."
| datavirtue wrote:
| I have gotten that advice from lawyers. I just kept
| hitting up new lawyers until I found one that saw things
| my way. Resulted in a windfall for me.
| torstenvl wrote:
| Glad it worked out for you, but it's a bad idea to
| extrapolate that to broader advice. Maybe you got lucky.
| Maybe it wasn't luck and you have some kind of gift for
| assessing case trajectory. But in either case, most
| people aren't going to be able to predict a case outcome
| better than experienced attorneys.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| two out of three common auto mechanics were caught here
| giving false estimates and cheating to some extent on
| common operations.. how many people can discern minor
| errors with law?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > In my experience, a lawyer will also nudge you towards
| whichever course involves keeping a lawyer involved.
|
| Both of the times my wife and I have consulted an attorney,
| they provided an overview of the relevant legal and
| practical context, a description of options of how to
| approach it and what they could do as part of that and the
| fee structure involved, and a description of why hiring
| them would probably _not_ be cost-effective for the issue
| at hand.
| ChrisLomont wrote:
| I've consulted lawyers perhaps a dozen times in life, and
| not once have they attempted to make me use them. Most
| actually help me in the 30 or so minutes free to find a
| better solution. A few times I had to go all in and hire
| them: I won a copyright infringement suit, stopping someone
| from selling knockoffs of things I sell, I needed some to
| represent me in states half way across the country to get a
| trust drawn in that state rejiggered, I won a case against
| a landlord. Each of those times I needed one to screw it up
| by not hiring a lawyer could have cost me significant
| money. And in each case, by hiring one when I was in in the
| right, the lawyers delivered. And only the copyright suit
| was expensive to pay lawyers for - the rest would amount to
| a few months rent to obtain significantly more in return.
|
| This is also the experience of a few friends I consult each
| time I weight "do I need a lawyer". So my experience is
| 100% the opposite of yours.
|
| How many times have you used a lawyer for something and had
| your example happen? How many times have they not done what
| you claim? Care to share examples?
| mfrye0 wrote:
| This. While I respect lawyers immensely, I think half the
| battle is deciding when to use a lawyer vs handling it
| yourself.
|
| With that said, this guy definitely needs to consult with a
| lawyer.
| JohnHaugeland wrote:
| > Spending $300-1000 on a consult
|
| bruh consults are free, you're getting worked
| prepend wrote:
| There are free consults, but then you aren't their client.
| Paying for an hours time gets a more detailed consult and
| makes you a client that gives me more meaningful iformation
| and also some "work."
| y4mi wrote:
| > _Anecdotally, I've never fucked anything up royally._
|
| You're not necessarily wrong, but that's definitely a
| survivalship bias. You only need to lose once for a game
| over, so everyone still playing underestimates the stakes at
| play, as there is close to no interaction to people that have
| lost.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias
| prepend wrote:
| I agree. And it balances out the survivorship bias of "I
| always get a lawyer."
|
| I'm not sure of a good way to balance out and correct for
| my bias other than just trying to think critically for when
| I need and don't need a lawyer.
| otterley wrote:
| Which type of error do you feel more comfortable making?
|
| One type of error is paying a lawyer when you didn't need
| one, in which case, you're out $X.
|
| The other type of error is _not_ paying a lawyer when you
| _did_ need one, in which case, you 're out $Y.
|
| In my experience, the values here are frequently $Y >>>
| $X.
|
| In the end, the choice is yours; you rolls your dice and
| takes your chances.
| dt3ft wrote:
| Of course an attorney would tell you to hire an attorney.
| harryvederci wrote:
| You can add a layer in between: there are countries with a
| governmental institution[0] where you can go to for basic legal
| advice. They may point you to an attorney if needed, but for
| basic things they can give you advice themselves.
|
| [0] Dutch example: "Het Juridisch Loket"
| hedora wrote:
| In the US, you can call your local bar association. They'll
| generally find an appropriate lawyer, and charge a small
| amount for the initial consult/matchmaking.
| hn_throwaway_69 wrote:
| I take the view that there needs to be a penalty for people who
| send out these letters but fail in their ultimate claim.
|
| If you send cease and desist letters without merit you should be
| forced to indemnify the respondent for the entirety of their
| attorney's fees and pay exemplary damages.
|
| This would require lawyers to make a careful assessment about
| prospects of success, rather than hoping to scare the other side
| into capitulation.
|
| These heavy handed tactics are just dreadful and shouldn't be
| accepted in any rational legal system.
|
| To avoid doubt, I'm not saying that their claim doesn't have
| merit. Unfortunately you will need to pay a lawyer to find out.
| yosito wrote:
| I believe you can usually file in small claims court to recover
| your legal fees.
| jfengel wrote:
| I don't disagree, but I know many lawyers do. They believe it
| will just cause the reverse problem, that you'll be afraid to
| sue even when you have good cause. The rich win either way.
|
| It seems to me that there are enough cases of obvious
| misbehavior like this that don't get punished, but I get that
| it would open up a lot of risks where it would be a matter of
| opinion. They hate judgment calls if they can possibly avoid
| them.
|
| They like the law to be black and white, which means they
| rarely punish lawsuits that follow the rules. Even when it's
| clear to anyone else that the rules are being abused.
| logicalmonster wrote:
| This is a great idea.
|
| What is particularly galling to me is how media companies
| trying to protect their content rights make completely
| meritless legal claims such as mass sending false DMCA requests
| to video sites saying that they own some work that is
| completely false, with no punishment for spamming out factually
| incorrect claims and harming people. That whole messed up
| system has been commented on many times in other threads.
|
| For actual legal filings, the only issue is that how a "case
| without merit" is defined is probably very subjective, because
| legislation can be very complex and lawyers can make a legal
| argument backed up by some statute for just about anything.
| There needs to be an extremely high standard for what
| constitutes a meritless case that should be punished in this
| way, because otherwise it also makes seeking restitution for
| wrongs risky, and that's not a good outcome either.
|
| Similarly good ideas in this vein IMO include: simplifying the
| language of laws, making the actual text of laws more easily
| accessible, and sunsetting/time-limits on old legislation so
| that old ideas that no longer make sense aren't kept permanent
| due solely to bureaucratic inertia.
| jawns wrote:
| Check this out:
|
| https://tmep.uspto.gov/RDMS/TMEP/current#/current/TMEP-900d1...
|
| Just like patents have a concept of "prior art," trademarks have
| a concept of "first use in commerce."
|
| If you can demonstrate that you were the first to use the
| trademark, you have less to worry about (but nothing's guaranteed
| until litigated).
|
| HOWEVER, if the party that registered the trademark can
| demonstrate that they used it prior to you, regardless of when
| they registered it, then they may have the upper hand.
|
| This is probably not DIY territory; consult a lawyer knowledgable
| about trademark law to help you determine how to respond.
|
| They may, in fact, recommend that you countersue for
| infringement. Might not be worth your time to pursue, but at
| least in theory you could claim that they're infringing on your
| trademark, because the U.S. follows a "first to use" rather than
| a "first to file" trademark system.
| nprateem wrote:
| I'd love to know what that means in plain English especially
| since the trademark has already been granted.
| jeremyjh wrote:
| Acquiring a trademark just sets a floor for when you acquired
| the trademark, it doesn't mean someone else hasn't already
| acquired it - that is a question that courts have to settle.
| masklinn wrote:
| > it doesn't mean someone else hasn't already acquired it
|
| It goes further than that: trademarks are registered in 45
| different classes and trademarks of different classes are
| completely independent, but the USPTO goes by
|
| > "Trademark, same name, same class"
|
| meaning more than one entity can register the same
| trademark _name_ in the same class, because trademarks have
| a requirement of _distinctiveness_.
| eh9 wrote:
| Reply saying you'll sell it to them for N and see how quickly
| they change their tune.
| randomdata wrote:
| _> Do not follow any "free legal advice" from HN -- and I'm
| speaking as an actual licensed attorney._
|
| Not sure how to interpret this free legal advice.
| rblatz wrote:
| I'd talk to a lawyer about drafting a counter letter saying you
| were unaware of them using your brand and that they need to do
| all those things back to you since you have been using the name
| longer. Also petition the trademark office to invalidate their
| claim due to your prior use.
| [deleted]
| philprx wrote:
| Send them a cease and desist and tell them you're going to sue
| for attempted fraud (or better term):
|
| They have no right to their claim and are using abusive language
| to make you do something under threat.
|
| You can get quite some money out of it I believe.
|
| IANAL and this is not a legal advice.
| fma wrote:
| I hope they can turn around, sue them and take their .net
| domain name.
|
| I also IANAL and this is not a legal advice.
| oliwarner wrote:
| > within 3 days
|
| Well that's a scam.
|
| If they're going to sue you, let them. You literally have prior
| use of the term and if you have to prove that, you can with
| comical ease.
|
| They know this... which is why this sounds like bullies trying to
| scare you into giving up a domain they can't afford to pay for.
| Scary letters are cheap. Write one back asking they reassign
| their trademark to you?
|
| But seriously, probably get paid advice first, and don't worry
| about this 3 day nonsense. Nobody works that fast.
|
| And remember that trademarks are classed. Rarely does somebody
| get exclusive use of a name in all senses. You might not be able
| to sell what they sell under their trademark, but they don't have
| rights to the word in generic senses.
|
| Oh and probably approach a regulatory body about their
| solicitors. This isn't an appropriate way to conduct business.
| geocrasher wrote:
| don't worry about this 3 day nonsense. Nobody works that fast.
|
| This was a red flag for me too. 3 days to take action? It takes
| longer than that to get anything done these days. They're
| trying to scare you into compliance. Three days is not enough
| time to get legal advice from an actual lawyer who is versed in
| domain name law, and respond.
|
| If you're gonna spend any money with a lawyer, have one write
| up a "go away or I'll let this go to trial and you can pay my
| legal fees" letter to send back to them.
| darrenwestall wrote:
| https://nissan.com/ Seems relevant here :)
| degenerate wrote:
| I was hoping someone pointed this one out. Granted, they've
| blogged about spending tens of thousands of dollars on lawyer
| fees and the owner's last name is Nissan. But still, it's a
| good case study of the little guy winning.
| unreal37 wrote:
| Poor Uzi Nissan. They should have just offered him $1 million
| and bought it from him. Years of stress, courts, and lawyers
| fees.
|
| On the other hand, "MikeRoweSoft" clearly was playing on
| Microsoft and I can see why he lost that battle.
| hugoromano wrote:
| Two months ago, I had a similar experience with one "lawyer", the
| same letter from another "lawyer" a week later. In the end, none
| were "lawyers"; they were domain squatters. I ignored them, and
| they went away. (this is not legal advice, but you have to be
| sure if these are lawful people or scammers).
| rolph wrote:
| own.net is not own.com, it looks to me like they are trying to
| dupe you into "voluntarily" relinquishing your domain, and will
| try to argue that the similarities of subdomain, are so much
| stronger, than the dissimilarities btween root domains that it is
| damaging and they deserve control over a root domain that has a
| similar subdomain.
|
| thats a big hunch, and i dont see that going in a good direction
| at all, for anyone, if my hunch is actually fact, rather than
| hunch
| justinc8687 wrote:
| On a semi-related note, I registered a trademark for my company
| and the .com is just domain squatting. The .com preexists my
| trademark however. Do I have any grounds to try and claim it or
| am I SOL. I know if they were actually using it for a business,
| it'd be one thing, but it's a generic domain-for-sale page
| instead.
| emteycz wrote:
| Have you asked them to sell? Usually the price is not even that
| bad - especially in comparison to any legal fees this endeavor
| might cost you.
| justinc8687 wrote:
| They wanted like $80,000. My company makes that in annual
| revenue, so it's a nonstarter.
| emteycz wrote:
| Try to reply you can pay $5k...
| justinc8687 wrote:
| Also related, there's a "tv" domain, registered after my
| trademark that serves porn. Same question.
|
| For this one, I've taken the general position that as long as
| they don't show up in the first 3 pages of google results for
| "company", I don't really care, but same question.
|
| For context, my company is a saas booking platform for outdoor
| recreation businesses.
| unreal37 wrote:
| Just to be clear, domain squatting has a definition. The fact
| that a domain you want isn't currently available is not domain
| squatting.
|
| "What is domain squatting? This is the practicing of buying a
| domain name for the sole purpose of preventing someone else
| from buying it. Typically, the buyer will then resell the
| domain name at a higher price to a buyer who is desperate to
| pay for the domain. The domain squatter takes a risk in trying
| to find a domain that someone else will be willing to pay at an
| up-charge to buy the domain in the future."
|
| If the .com "preexists your trademark", it's harder to prove
| they bought it to prevent you from buying it. If you're a small
| business smaller than $80K per year in revenue, it's likely
| they don't even know you exist.
| chrischen wrote:
| Basically this exact same thing happened to my business with an
| individual (some guy who's main business appeared to be acquiring
| and selling domains) who setup a very similar trademark,
| registered the domain (very similar), setup a dummy business on
| the domain, and then sent us a cease and desist trying to extort
| (we did a call with them where they basically told us they knew
| it'd cost us a lot of money to litigate and it cost them almost
| nothing to keep their dummy business up) us for six figures.
|
| We ended up litigating and canceling their registered trademark
| with the USPTO by proving our business and website were setup
| before theirs. If you have over 7+ years of business and public
| records this should be a pretty open and close case. The bad news
| is however even if that is the case it can take 2-3 years
| (probably due to pandemic)and a lot of money. In our case it cost
| less than $10k, so the guy's extortion made no sense.
|
| It also didn't help their case that the guy lifted verbatim copy
| from my website, including my TOS with my address! I'm not sure
| if the judge even looked at this though.
| [deleted]
| wyldfire wrote:
| > If anything I would have thought they should be the ones
| changing their name, as I was using the name 7+ years before them
| with a similar product
|
| FWIW this is the kind of protection you could get by registering
| your business/product's mark. I'd say it's still possible but
| probably slightly harder to do now.
| stanislavb wrote:
| Please, share the name of the company. Let's name and shame them.
| I hate this kind of law-aggressiveness.
| therealmarv wrote:
| They cannot take away your .com away if you have it for a longer
| time. Trademark does not give companies a free pass to take away
| your domain name, especially when their company was not existing
| when you've registered your domain name. It's not how this works.
| Trademark is a kind of protection, a company name alone,
| registering a domain name (all without trademark) is also a kind
| of claim and protection. Trademarks work for the future and not
| into the past, especially not into a past where the company
| registering the trademark was not existing! I would completely
| ignore what they demand.
| FigmentEngine wrote:
| Assume you are in Oz and they are in US so be aware that laws are
| different, as well as scooe of any marks granted (doubt they have
| an internatonal mark), as daid by others marks also cme wth
| limitayions on them - so see what mark they have.
|
| check your registration rules, and reach out to them to explain
| what is happening, stop any end run on your registra.
| paxys wrote:
| Disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer and this isn't legal advice.
|
| Assuming both parties are in the US, this is the key legislation
| around domain squatting:
| https://cyber.harvard.edu/property00/domain/legislation.html.
|
| You haven't told us anything about what you do with the domain,
| but since you registered it quite a bit of time ago I'm assuming
| it has nothing to do with the company in question that sent you
| the letter.
|
| Looking at the clauses in the link, it seems pretty clear they
| they have no real case. Everyone's advice of getting a lawyer is
| obviously apt, but I'd say you can just save yourself the money
| and ignore this letter completely. There's a 99% chance that you
| will not hear back from them. If they do decide to actually
| escalate it, you can always get a lawyer at that point.
|
| A general piece of advice about the legal system - _nothing_ ever
| happens within 3 days. They are creating a false sense of urgency
| in order to scare /bully you.
|
| (As a side note, I get very annoyed when a random question on the
| internet is met with a hundred responses of "get a lawyer". I'm
| sure the person who posted it already knows that lawyers exist.
| What they are looking for is some free advice, not legal
| representation from HN.)
| chrischen wrote:
| Since the OP is running a legitimate business on it I wouldn't
| recommend them sitting on the trademark being owned by a
| competitor, even though I agree with you it sounds like the
| other party has no legal basis to do anything to them, even if
| they own the trademark. I am not a lawyer but this exact same
| thing happened to me and I did consult a lawyer.
| adventured wrote:
| OP should consult a lawyer with domain expertise and should
| seek to invalidate the threatening company's trademark, rather
| than doing nothing. File a petition to cancel the trademark
| with the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.
| gkoberger wrote:
| From the final sentence: "I was using the name 7+ years before
| them with a similar product"
|
| So it seems like they aren't squatting, but genuinely using it
| (for a similar product, which makes sense)
| nprateem wrote:
| I thought that was the point of trademarks, being able to control
| their use. Please post your experiences after you've had legal
| advice since I'd have assumed you wouldn't have a leg to stand
| on.
| theartfuldodger wrote:
| This has happened to me several times, I have never taken it
| seriously or put much effort into responding.
|
| I usually would go straight to the throat and very personal.
|
| Publish their letter on the domain they seek, capture all lawyer
| and company details and publish to site.
|
| Use opsec for phone numbers, call them at terrible hours ( at
| home) to discuss offers of payment.
|
| They are trying to bleed you with superior resources so guerrilla
| tactics are best ( legal of course)
|
| They act different when they realize they are exposed and you
| don't care about normal processes.
|
| Lol, I should make my own David v Goliath service.
|
| Depends on the size of Goliath. No one scary came for me and a
| few 2am calls led to crickets.
| [deleted]
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > call them at terrible hours ( at home)
|
| This is a really nasty idea. You'll be bothering their family
| who have nothing to do with it. Sounds like you're advocating
| harassment of people's families.
| foxhop wrote:
| Everyone is a family, except ENTITIES who are not humans.
|
| Wrote a poem and song to explain:
|
| ---
|
| WRONG is Tyranny.
|
| TYRANNY is WRONG, inherently so, DISASTER is WHEN, all SPARKs
| vibrate LOW!
|
| ---
|
| Tempest, Monster, part of the ONE.
|
| cancer's role as DOVE, painful extraordinary, deserves LOVE,
| not respect or authority.
|
| ---
|
| Vortex Universe
|
| Sometimes we VIBRATE down, to ASCEND up again.
| mindslight wrote:
| They're already harassing you under the guise of a legal
| process. A clock punching attorney won't be emotionally
| invested in the details of a matter, but the victims of such
| nastygrams are - the main goal of such letters is to make you
| stressed and worried so you just cave - hence the corollary
| of hiring a professional who will handle it impersonally
|
| Two wrongs don't make a right, and it certainly may be
| imprudent to escalate. But there's no moral ground for them
| to stand on here - they're in the same category as any other
| spammer. Furthermore nowhere did OP advocate deliberately
| expanding the scope to their family. If phone calls at
| inconvenient-to-them times end up bothering their family as
| well, it's because they didn't do the work to separate their
| family from their ugly business.
|
| In general I don't buy into the idea of declaring some times
| as off limits for phone calls, since society has never given
| me the same courtesy in the early morning. I'd much rather
| get calls at 10PM than 10AM, and yet it's somehow acceptable
| for businesses to return an afternoon call at 9AM sharp and
| pretend they're doing their best to communicate.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| A lot of words to justify that you know you'll likely be
| impacting someone who did nothing against you.
| mindslight wrote:
| I'm sure many more words have been written by legal
| nastygrammers justifying their own actions of unsolicited
| aggression.
| amluto wrote:
| > Use opsec for phone numbers, call them at terrible hours ( at
| home) to discuss offers of payment.
|
| IANAL, but if your goal is to give the them additional grounds
| for suing you, you may be off to a good start.
| np_tedious wrote:
| I think the idea is that it's plausibly someone else calling,
| since you made the documents containing contact info public
| (which is legal I hope?).
| voakbasda wrote:
| This. If it is legal, you should at least consider escalating
| as far as you are comfortable. You are now at war, whether you
| like it or not. Never back down, never surrender.
| gunshai wrote:
| This is the type of comment I come to HN for. I try to explain
| to my partner there is always alternative ways to handle
| matters, and going with "the process" has inevitable outcomes.
| Probably good they work at a bank and I well... Don't
|
| Can you further elaborate on your story I am very curious?
| fillskills wrote:
| This is what worked for me a few times. It is painful for a bit
| but better than spending money on a lawyer. I would also
| suggest to try and find a lawyer in your network willing to
| help at below their retail price. Despite the bad rep, lawyers
| are humans and are very eager to help good people
| [deleted]
| matthewfcarlson wrote:
| Sounds absolutely ruthless and I quite like it. Don't think I'm
| bold enough to do it myself but I'm always surprised how much
| being persistent gets you when you're talking to companies.
| brippalcharrid wrote:
| If one was short of time, one could always put out a tender
| so that several (hundred) different independent agents could
| speculatively contact them in order to conduct negotiations,
| then present you with offers that you could compare. If those
| agents were in turn having trouble establishing contact, they
| could farm out this effort to others who had more time and
| expertise in this area.
| syntaxing wrote:
| Genuinely curious, isn't there merit (I guess in terms of law?)
| for OP to do the same to the .net company?
| gostsamo wrote:
| Can you share who they are? Not naming them only helps in letting
| them hide their crime in darkness.
| scosman wrote:
| I am not a lawyer, this isn't legal advice. Definitely don't
| respond yourself, get a qualified lawyer in with track record in
| startups/domains to write back (and advise). The letterhead goes
| a long way here in showing you're not trivial to push around. If
| facts as presented here are truthful, there is a reasonable
| chance of never hearing from them again.
| smorgusofborg wrote:
| Unless they are in the porn business, a porn site is not
| trademark infringement..
| danlugo92 wrote:
| Web3 and Bitcoin fix this.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Is this correct?
|
| Is it correct that they will sue you if you don't comply? Maybe,
| that's up to them.
|
| Is it correct that your use of the domain name violates their
| trademark? Also, maybe. That depends on the market you are in,
| the market they are in and that the trademark is registered for,
| and other things.
|
| If you aren't willing to just hand over the domain, and don't
| want to just roll the dice on liability, you should seek
| professional legal advice, and not respond _in any way_ until you
| have received and considered that advice.
| JohnHaugeland wrote:
| I am not a lawyer.
|
| > Is it correct that your use of the domain name violates their
| trademark? Also, maybe
|
| No. As an issue of black letter law, if they can demonstrate
| that they were using it before the issuance, it does not
| violate trademark, by design.
|
| Many trademarks are lost this way.
| JohnHaugeland wrote:
| Get an attorney and push back.
|
| All they're doing is losing their trademark here. If you were
| using it before them, it shouldn't have been assigned to them.
|
| GET AN ATTORNEY.
|
| But to calm down, read about "stop and go" in Pittsburgh in the
| 90s. There was a store called that about an hour's drive outside
| the city. Then a gas station convenience chain merger tried to
| take on that name for 150 stores. About two years later the
| original store found out and said no. The 150 store behemoth
| tried to sue.
|
| The 150 stores are now called CoGo's.
| radley wrote:
| Yes, consult a lawyer. Also understand, nothing happens in 3
| days. This is all a bluff to scare you into responding and
| signing away your rights without proper advice.
| emteycz wrote:
| Put it into your spam folder
| libertine wrote:
| I always found amusing reading The Pirate Bay email responses
| to lawyers from Dreamworks, EA, Apple, etc.
| xivzgrev wrote:
| Sounds like they always wanted your domain, and this was their
| attempt to get it. Their big scary letter is basically a bunch of
| "give up your legitimate rights for nothing"
|
| Consult with a lawyer. Intuitively their case makes no sense, but
| actual law is not always intuitive
| [deleted]
| unreal37 wrote:
| I would say "no". Or ignore it.
|
| Don't ask for money. Being seen as "domain squatting" them will
| work against you in a tribunal.
| thesuperbigfrog wrote:
| Perhaps you should get a lawyer to advise you of your rights and
| options.
| bshep wrote:
| Out of curiosity, I have a similar question in the same vein.
|
| I own MY_LAST_NAME.com, me and my family use it for email, ( i.e.
| firname@lastnane.com ) should we register a trademark to protect
| ourselves from this type of bullying? Are we safe since its our
| own last name?
| bhartzer wrote:
| Personal names generally cannot be trademarked. You would most
| likely need to have a business or other use case of your last
| name in order to be granted a trademark.
| bshep wrote:
| Does this apply even if I have an LLC with my name?
|
| TBH this scares me quite a bit since we have all the family's
| emails tied to the domain, not only would it be a huge pain
| to lose it but also a security risk. Weve had the domain for
| 10yrs or more at this point...
| unreal37 wrote:
| You don't have YOUR_LAST_NAME.com as a website, right?
|
| You probably don't have anything to worry about. Having a
| domain that does not have a business attached means you're
| clearly not trying to do business on someone else's name.
| That takes away at least one of the 9 tests for trademark
| infringement.
| toss1 wrote:
| First, contact an attorney who specializes in this area of
| business and law.
|
| Meanwhile, also look up that law firm that sent you the letter
| and see what you can find out about them (e.g., are they even
| legit, what kind of other cases do they handle, etc).
|
| And search for any information you can find about this other
| company and the people. What have they done? do they own
| property? What other businesses? Criminal records? etc. etc. etc.
|
| Also gather all your own records - business formation, original
| site registration and registration history, logs of any marketing
| and advertising you have ever done, etc.. Anything that shows you
| actively using this trademark over time and as far back in time
| as you can establish.
|
| Bring this data to your new specialist attny.
| ThrustVectoring wrote:
| There are, roughly speaking, two categories of businesses that
| receive this letter and differentiate themselves based off their
| response:
|
| 1) "Hobbyists" and the like who are not doing anything
| particularly valuable with the trademark and domain name. Even if
| these people _can_ prevail in a lawsuit, the other company is
| hoping that the owner decides they can 't (or won't) risk the
| time, money, and stress of going through a civil lawsuit.
|
| 2) People with valuable businesses whose rights are worth
| defending. The other company is already pretty sure you're _not_
| in this category, since you haven 't vigorously defending your
| naming rights to date.
|
| Overall, you have prior use, and may be able to "win" if it gets
| to an actual lawsuit. The strength of your legal claim isn't the
| problem; if you have to spend high-five figures to keep the
| rights to your hobbyist website, you have _already_ lost. Your
| goal is to convince these folks to leave you alone on as
| favorable terms as possible. If your domain name is not
| particularly valuable and important to you, this likely means A)
| hiring an attorney, B) using their services to convince the other
| company that you 're in the second category, and then C) selling
| them your domain name for significantly more than it's worth to
| you. If your domain name _is_ valuable to you, the only thing
| that changes is that you may need to pay the stochastic taxes
| that businesses have to pay to have access to the legal system
| for dispute resolution, and you might have a hilarious "thank
| you for informing us of your clients' violation of our trademark
| rights" demand letter sent back at them.
| [deleted]
| musesum wrote:
| I had a 4 letter domain name. A stock photo company trademarked
| the name and then threatened to sue to force transfer. However, I
| registered the domain before they registered the trademark. I
| looked up the ICANN rules and saw I had priority. Pointed out the
| ICANN rule and told to go away. They did.
|
| IANAL; this is not legal advice.
| masklinn wrote:
| Also IANAL but these demands make even less sense due to
| trademarks being categorised in _classes_ , that you own
| Douche(r) registered in rubber products doesn't mean someone
| else can't have Douche(r) furnitures, and both have a
| reasonable and compatible claim to the name (for instance there
| are at least 5 different companies or organisations called
| "Apple" with presence in the US).
|
| Furthermore, _the USPTO allows multiple trademarks with the
| same name in the same class_ , because trademarks must be
| distinctive and unless the name is completely made up and
| demonstrably novel (e.g. Blu-Ray, Kodak) it's not distinctive
| and does not inherently constitute a trademark (though generic
| trademarks can _acquire_ distinctiveness through use e.g.
| "apple" would probably be considered distinctive).
| kingcharles wrote:
| Right. OP could register the trademark for his domain in
| another class right now and then see what happens...
| rbanffy wrote:
| > for instance there are at least 5 different companies or
| organisations called "Apple" with presence in the US
|
| An interesting trivia is that Apple Computer got in trouble
| with Apple, the record label, when they introduced the Apple
| IIgs, because it had a musical instrument synthesiser chip
| built in.
| organsnyder wrote:
| I thought the issue happened when they launched iTunes.
| Perhaps it happened both times.
| [deleted]
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| But the further detail on that is the reason for this is
| that Apple Records and Apple Computer had previously signed
| a settlement agreement where Apple Records promised not to
| get into the computer business and Apple Computer promised
| not to get into the music business.
|
| Obviously, subsequent court cases and agreements allowed
| Apple Computer to get into music. Lots of details on
| Wikipedia:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer
| aasasd wrote:
| > _Douche(r) furnitures_
|
| Somehow that does have the cadence and sound of a 'premium'
| brand, or at least faux-premium. The 'registered' symbol
| really sells it, though.
|
| In these post-ironic times, I can easily see this name being
| used.
| PinguTS wrote:
| Right. Had the same issue years ago. Did the same and worked
| the same.
|
| Just point them to
| https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/help/dndr/udrp-en
| stevenalowe wrote:
| Not a lawyer. Talk to one. In your country.
|
| In the USA, if there might be customer confusion between your two
| businesses then there is grounds for a cease and desist, but you
| have precedence. Might consider turning the tables and sending
| them a cease and desist :) perhaps they'd like to give you the
| .net domain as an apology
| aartav wrote:
| IANAL, but at least according to ICANN rules you have nothing to
| worry about unless "your domain name has been registered and is
| being used in bad faith". You can see the specific definition of
| "bad faith" and the rules around this here
| https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/policy-2012-02-25-en
|
| Its easy to prove you are not acting in bad faith because your
| ownership precedes the trademark. I personally own and use
| several domains that others hold trademarks on, but all of mine
| were registered before those companies established trademarks.
| harryvederci wrote:
| General remarks for these types of posts:
|
| - People often mention 0 countries. Where do you operate? Where
| was your company founded? How about the other company? Etc. How
| do you know if that helpful comment doens't assume something
| totally different?
|
| - Are you really going to feel confident about your legal
| situation after reading comments on a platform like Hacker News?
| sebow wrote:
| I agree about the country point.However i am curious whether
| having the [Company Name] registered properly [Ltd, Co., s.r.o,
| s.r.l, etc] is an actual argument for having the "right" to a
| domain name.Common sense tells me it's not,in the same country
| or between countries, unless obviously the person who has the
| company name impersonates that company.
|
| Why would one need to legally own that domain name as a company
| name to keep the domain? Makes no sense to me
| jonp888 wrote:
| When someone didn't feel the need to mention which country they
| are talking about, that's usually because they're American.
| niij wrote:
| This is a website hosted in America by an American investment
| company with a primarily American user base. Not hard to
| understand why. Either way the OP appears to be Australian,
| so please hold off judgement next time.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Your jump to conclusions mat is too bouncy. Americans do not
| call lawyers solicitors.
| havocsupreme wrote:
| It's mentioned in their comment history that they're
| Australian.
| [deleted]
| infotogivenm wrote:
| Not a lawyer but been in a similar situation. I will give the
| simple advice I wish I had followed:
|
| 1. Do not reply to the email yourself. 2. Get yourself a lawyer
| and keep a full accounting of all legal expenses.
| dominenames wrote:
| No, it's not correct to state that they have any right to the
| domain name. Anybody can sue anybody for anything, but they have
| no prospect of winning ownership of the domain name. Domain name
| conflicts like this are adjudicated by WIPO who would never grant
| the domain name in this situation:
| https://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/
| winterplace wrote:
| You are right. They are just trying to scare the owner into
| giving it up for free.
| paxys wrote:
| Doesn't matter what WIPO thinks if a judge who has jurisdiction
| over both parties orders the transfer. Not saying it will
| happen in this case, but you can definitely be compelled to
| hand over your domain name or risk contempt of court.
| nprateem wrote:
| Yeah seems you may be right:
| https://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/search/overview3.0/#item...
| dctoedt wrote:
| I'm an IP lawyer but not your lawyer, and I'm licensed only in
| Texas and California, so don't rely on this as legal advice. Back
| in the day I did a fair amount of trademark litigation but that
| was quite a few years ago; these days I do neither trademark work
| nor litigation.
|
| 1. A bit of Google-searching suggests that you're in Australia. I
| couldn't find any U.S. trademark registration for $NAME, where
| your .com domain is $NAME.com as listed on (what I surmise is)
| your Twitter header.
|
| 2. If the facts are _only_ as you say -- always a big "if" --
| the letter you describe would be ... let's just say, groundless,
| at least in the U.S.
|
| 3. If you own $NAME.com; AND: For seven-plus years you've
| actually been using $NAME as a trademark "in commerce" in the
| U.S. by shipping goods bearing the mark (or rendering services
| under the mark) in interstate- or foreign commerce; AND: You're
| being threatened with a U.S. trademark registration, AND: The
| registration hasn't been made "incontestable" by the passage of
| five unopposed years; THEN: In theory you could petition the U.S.
| Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to cancel the other company's
| registration, on grounds that you're the senior user. That would
| not be cheap, and I _think_ this would require hiring a lawyer to
| represent you in the USPTO.
| https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/ttab/initiating-new-proceed...
|
| 4. You might find amusing the precedents at
| https://www.oncontracts.com/monster-cables-picked-the-wrong-...
| (response to a threatening letter from Monster Cable) and
| https://lettersofnote.com/2011/02/14/regarding-your-stupid-c...
| ("some asshole is signing your name to stupid letters"). In a
| similar vein, one of my late former law partners reputedly had a
| big BULLSHIT rubber stamp that he would supposedly apply to such
| letters and return them to the sender. (I don't remember ever
| seeing the stamp so it might have been a story that "evolved"
| over time.)
|
| 5. The title/headings that you list are mostly gorilla dust that
| unsophisticated lawyers throw up to try to get opposing parties
| to agree. There's no way you'd want to agree to all, or even
| most, of that without a BIG, buyout-type payday in return.
|
| Again, don't rely on the above as legal advice; when in doubt,
| consult a lawyer who's licensed in the relevant jurisdiction.
|
| EDIT: If you want, email me (see my HN profile); if this is a
| U.S. matter and it's not from one of my existing clients
| (extremely unlikely), maybe I can write and send an "appropriate"
| email response for a purely-nominal fee (but I wouldn't be able
| to take on anything more than that).
| [deleted]
| scrollinondubs wrote:
| IANAL but pretty sure trademark is based on first provable public
| use for commercial purposes. You should be able to contest the
| mark on that basis. Just screenshot the WHOIS record showing you
| had the domain 7yrs ago and hire a lawyer to write a cease &
| desist to them. Just because you hold the trademark doesn't make
| it necessarily defensible if it's proven that it was obtained
| surreptitiously. Depending on what you learn from the lawyer and
| how aggressive you want to play it threaten counter suit for
| damages and escalate.
|
| But agree with all comments: get a lawyer before you do anything.
| imglorp wrote:
| If you haven't registered the trademark, does holding the domain
| have any legal merit?
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| If he's doing business under that domain name, he is using it
| as an unregistered trademark and still gets some protection
| from that. In some cases, including when someone new starts a
| similar business with the same name, it can have the same force
| as a registered trademark.
| masklinn wrote:
| > does holding the domain have any legal merit?
|
| There... is no relation between the two?
| bryans wrote:
| "In the United States, it is not registration, but actual use
| of a designation as a mark that creates rights and priority
| over others. Thus, the rule is that ownership of a mark goes to
| the first-to-use, not the first-to-file."
|
| https://www.legalteamusa.net/trademark-law-first-to-use-v-fi...
| natch wrote:
| You don't need to have registered. You get trademark ownership
| automatically without any registration if you are the first to
| use a distinctive mark in interstate commerce. Having
| registered can help assert your claim though. IANAL.
| bhartzer wrote:
| You need to speak with a qualified domain name attorney, not just
| any attorney or solicitor.
|
| As Director of a domain name protection company (and not an
| attorney) I can offer this:
|
| If you registered the domain name before the other party files
| for a trademark, then there is no way you would have known that
| they would file for the mark. So, in most cases you probably
| don't have to give up the domain name. It comes down to whether
| or. Or you registered the domain "in bad faith" or not. And
| again, how would you know they would start their business and get
| a trademark? You wouldn't.
|
| Are you in the same industry and compete with each other? If so,
| there might be an issue, but I'd your site offers different
| products and there would be no confusion between companies or
| websites, then there may not be an issue.
|
| The best way to handle this is to get a domain name attorney to
| respond to their letter to you, essentially telling them to go
| away, and that you plan on keeping the domain name.
|
| If you cannot afford an attorney, look for a company that offers
| domain name insurance or a domain name warranty, if you have an
| issue like this with your domain name, your legal fees to defend
| the domain are covered.
|
| As you have described the situation here, you bought the domain
| before they filed for their trademark, and you're not pretending
| to be them. So you should be able to keep the domain. They are
| just trying to " strong arm" the domain away from you with a
| threatening letter. If they do sue you or file a udrp, defend
| yourself with the help of a good domain name attorney.
| gnu8 wrote:
| > They are just trying to " strong arm" the domain away from
| you with a threatening letter.
|
| This isn't ok and making them go away isn't good enough. They
| need to pay for having made that long list of demands and
| threats, ideally by having their whole business taken away and
| given to OP.
| tomxor wrote:
| >Are you in the same industry and compete with each other? If
| so, there might be an issue
|
| ...
|
| > as I was using the name 7+ years before them with a similar
| product
|
| Sounds like they are, but that the issue is in the reverse,
| they are trying to steal the authors market and product
| directly by using their name. This is very aggressive, not to
| mention wrong.
| grammarnazzzi wrote:
| > If anything I would have thought they should be the ones
| changing their name, ...
|
| No doubt that they did think of that. Instead they decided on
| intimidation as an opening strategy.
|
| > ... as I was using the name 7+ years before them with a
| similar product
|
| So they are guilty of what they are accusing you of. You
| could: 1) threaten to counter sue and settle for a price, or
| 2) sell them your .com
|
| They've no doubt they have anticipated these responses as
| well and are prepared to negotiate. They simply decided to
| open the negotiations at $0
| paxys wrote:
| There's really no way to say that with the limited amount of
| info in the post. There can be two legit businesses in the
| same space with similar names. This is incredibly common in
| tech.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| Hope to read a follow up post one day about how the end
| result of this letter is the company who sent the letter
| loses their trademark and domains.
| tomxor wrote:
| > the company who sent the letter loses their trademark and
| domains.
|
| That may not be punishment enough to prevent them from
| becoming a repeat offender. In an ideal world the result
| would cost the directors the right to start a business for
| a long period of time.
|
| I don't see that as too severe in any light - This is
| pretty close to fraud: trying to undercut market forces by
| dishonestly claiming rights to the name of a business with
| 7 years more history.
|
| Their only defence to malicious intent would be ignorance
| of the author's business existence prior to theirs - which
| is completely unbelievable considering that's the first and
| most obvious fact that will be used to settle the issue.
| Their lawyers would have to claim complete incompetence.
| donmcronald wrote:
| It's really too bad it's so expensive to pursue issues like
| this. If the .net company has more money than the OP they
| could even end up with the .com even though no one would
| consider it fair.
|
| I think it would cost a lot of money to invalidate a
| trademark, especially if the company that owns it has deep
| pockets and even a UDRP complaint can cost in the range of
| $5k from what I've read. I think that's why so many
| mediocre .coms sell in the $2-4k range. It's cheaper to pay
| the domain/trademark squatters for the guarantee of getting
| what you want than it is to (maybe) prove their
| registration was in bad faith.
| donmcronald wrote:
| > If you cannot afford an attorney, look for a company that
| offers domain name insurance or a domain name warranty, if you
| have an issue like this with your domain name, your legal fees
| to defend the domain are covered.
|
| I've never heard of that before and all I can find trying to
| search are sites about the `.insurance` TLD.
|
| Anyone got any links to some examples?
| [deleted]
| netengineer1 wrote:
| Unless they start a UDPR claim with WIPO, they are hoping you
| will just hand it over.
|
| This has happened to me. Ignore them until WIPO claim shows up.
| Which they probably tried and were denied. A good example is
| nissan.com
|
| https://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/guide/
| tmaly wrote:
| I have had a .com since 2003. A SF startup made a INC after my
| name and got the .org. They called me at my work and I just said
| I have business plans for domain. They trademark the name, but
| have not bothered me.
| goatherders wrote:
| My experience has been that you can tell them to pound sand. They
| are hoping the threat of legal action will cause you to panic out
| of fear. I suspect if you reply "no" you will never hear from
| them again.
| andrew2984 wrote:
| It's not correct and does sound ridiculous. I highly recommend
| calling a domain attorney. Most will give you a free
| consultation. One person who specializes in this type of dispute
| is John Berryhill: https://johnberryhill.com/
| marckohlbrugge wrote:
| They might be using scare tactics hoping you'll hand over the
| domain name without question. But I wonder if they have a case.
|
| My suggestion would be to either A) ignore and see if they go
| away, and/or B) have a domain name lawyer send a reply showing
| you won't roll over. That's usually enough for parties like these
| to back down.
|
| If you need a lawyer recommendation send me DM me on Twitter
| (@marckohlbrugge). More than happy to help.
|
| FWIW, some people might mention a procedure called 'UDRP' which
| is typically used by TM owners to quickly and cheaply get a TM-
| infringing domain name. However, one of the requirements for a
| successful UDRP case is that the TM needs to have been issued
| BEFORE the domain name was registered. Which is not the case
| here. So a UDRP approach would fail for them.
|
| The other way for them would indeed be to sue and try to claim TM
| infringement in court. I don't have much experience with TM law,
| so I'm not sure what your odds of winning are. But there might
| even be a way to get their TM invalidated.
|
| TL;DR: Talk to a lawyer.
|
| P.S. If they have money for lawyers, they might also have money
| to buy your domain name. I wouldn't propose a purchase until
| you've talked to a lawyer (as it could hurt your case), but it's
| something to consider for later on.
| chx wrote:
| In particular, the UDRP rules include the following:
|
| --------------
|
| (ix) Describe, in accordance with the Policy, the grounds on
| which the complaint is made including, in particular,
|
| [...]
|
| (3) why the domain name(s) should be considered as having been
| registered and being used in bad faith
|
| --------------
| marckohlbrugge wrote:
| Yes, although that criteria is somewhat subjective. Since an
| UDRP needs to meet all criteria, you can throw it out by just
| looking that the registration dates.
| winterplace wrote:
| Or option C) Negotiate a deal to get paid for the domain
|
| Marc, do you have an email address?
| marckohlbrugge wrote:
| marc(at)hey.com
|
| Note that I'm not a lawyer, but I've dealt with similar
| issues before through a qualified lawyer. Happy to introduce
| you. Not sharing name here publicly, because that could
| potentially be used against me. (i.e. someone intentionally
| creating a conflict of interest, etc)
| aalex123 wrote:
| What if I'm not an US citizen and a company from US (threaten to)
| sues me over a .com domain registered through an non-US
| registrar? Should I hire an US lawyer? Where does the trial take
| place: in US or in my country?
|
| Let's say I get an email like the one OP got but I don't
| understand english and I take no action... Will the non-US
| registrar give them my domain by default?
| trentnix wrote:
| Went through a similar situation where I owned (company).com and
| someone later filed for a trademark and registered
| the(company).com. I hired a trademark attorney and he sent a
| nastygram back.
|
| We had evidence of first use in commerce and offered not to
| sabotage their pursuit of a trademark. They immediately agreed,
| backed down, and signed a document allowing us to use the name
| unrestricted irrespective of whether they successfully obtained
| the trademark. As we expected, the trademark application was
| denied (the name was descriptive, not unique) and it was all
| behind us quickly.
|
| TLDR: get a lawyer. Trademark law is weird.
|
| And don't be mean - the other business is now your first call if
| you ever decide to sell.
| winterplace wrote:
| Did you get them to pay you for the non-compete?
|
| Yes the other option is to sell the domain for a profit.
| codingdave wrote:
| Opening a dialogue about this would have been the professional
| approach. Blasting you with a long list of demands means they are
| trying to bully you. Cease and desist letters are just a way of
| trying to scare you into doing what they want so they don't need
| to do things the hard way. I'd recommend asking a lawyer if they
| have a case to make against you, just to be safe. But if they
| don't, this letter means nothing.
| dylan604 wrote:
| And their 3 day demand is total horseshit of a play as well.
| You have done the research, and feel they do not have in-house
| representation. It is done on a Friday, so 2 of the 3 days is
| weekend. Finding a lawyer in 3 days is not simple, and doing it
| with 2 of the 3 being a weekend when a lawyer is impossible to
| find is just bullying 101.
|
| Fuck people like this. I feel bad for the Op, but sadly, I am
| jaded by the BS games that bullies play and win. I wish karma
| 1000x upon people that do this kind of bullshit.
|
| We've all seen how part of the responsibilities of a brand is
| to protect it, but as someone else posted, there are ways of
| not being an asshole when protecting one's brand. Ultimate face
| saving for the company in question would be to realize what is
| ocurring and fire the legal team they have hired for this role,
| apologize for their behavior to the Op, and then amicially work
| out a resolution. However, I realize that this is such a low
| chance of ever happening to be laughable.
| otterley wrote:
| Three _business_ days. The demand letter requests a response
| by December 15, which is a Wednesday.
| dylan604 wrote:
| granted. so if the Op makes phone calls on day 1 (a
| Friday), how many return calls will he receive on day 2, a
| Monday? Doing anything on a Friday, aka take out the trash
| day, is just a game move to make things harder.
| otterley wrote:
| Lawyers understand that it takes time to get counsel for
| yourself. My experience is that if OP says, "I am in
| possession of your letter. I am in the process of
| retaining counsel. Please provide reasonable time for me
| to hire one and provide a full response," then that
| should be adequate. It's a standard response to such
| letters.
|
| (Not legal advice, etc.)
| technothrasher wrote:
| > there are ways of not being an asshole
|
| Yep, when somebody else started using my trademark in a
| slightly related business, I called my lawyer and discussed.
| We decided to offer that they license the trademark for $1
| and agree to discuss with me before using it in any new way.
| That way my trademark is protected and I don't need to be an
| asshole.
|
| Worked out well, we even threw each other business
| occasionally, and they went out of business after a couple
| years anyway.
| eevilspock wrote:
| Whatever you do, brogrammer2018, please post a follow up story
| here on HN.
| kstrauser wrote:
| If you're in the same industry, for bonus points consider filing
| to dissolve their trademark since they started using it long
| after you had been.
| PaywallBuster wrote:
| get a crowdfunding campaign to fight the evil corp on the courts
|
| get in touch with lawyers dealing with IP/trademarks
|
| you can have a brief talk w/ them to discuss options before
| making any decision :)
| paulschreiber wrote:
| The EFF has a cooperating attorneys list. They can refer you to
| someone who can help.
| temp8964 wrote:
| They are just trying to scare you. Many famous companies need to
| buy the domains from people registered earlier. There's no such
| thing as trademark automatically gives right to domain names.
| Tell them to use their own .net domain name and go away.
| pwg wrote:
| Seek the advice of a lawyer.
| Someone1234 wrote:
| While this is definitely a bunch a hot air, unfortunately they
| could frivolous sue you to simply win on financial grounds alone
| (in particular they could sue you in a location where the cost of
| travel would be expensive and if you ignored it they get a
| default judgement, or sue you in both state & federal courts for
| slightly different things and drown you in legal costs).
|
| I'd evaluate what your endgame is. If your endgame is to keep the
| domain then I'd get a lawyer in order to make it clear that you
| will respond to legal challenges (and, yes, the bill is going to
| run up). If you were willing to sell, for a price, then you
| should try to figure out how much a legal challenge would cost
| _them_ and set a price a bit higher than that.
|
| Is it fair? Absolutely not, but the US legal system is set up so
| that those with the deepest pockets often win. It isn't a fair
| fight for normal citizens, and even having the law on your side
| is often not enough because it is a financial battle more than a
| legal one.
|
| Either way may be wise to lawyer up today, either for a better
| selling price, cause them to back off entirely, or move it into
| the "bury you with costs" phase of bullying.
| Shamu wrote:
| > (in particular they could sue you in a location where the
| cost of travel would be expensive and if you ignored it they
| get a default judgement, or sue you in both state & federal
| courts for slightly different things and drown you in legal
| costs)
|
| "This past June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that plaintiffs
| cannot sue companies in a state where they may do business, but
| do not have significant connections to that state."
|
| Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of California (BMS)
|
| https://www.andruswagstaff.com/blog/supreme-court-rules-plai...
| yumraj wrote:
| OP used the word "Solicitor" so am assuming they are not in
| the US.
| throwawayHN378 wrote:
| If I'm not mistaken the lawsuit can be filed but you can win
| a challenge to jurisdiction. But in order to challenge
| jurisdiction you need to hire a bar certified attorney in
| that jurisdiction... thus defeating the point
| emteycz wrote:
| Huh, you can't defend yourself?
| wyldfire wrote:
| Yes, you can. But then you'd need to appear...
|
| obtw there's serious risk of trying to defend a suit
| yourself. Maybe the judge would take pity on you and
| grant a continuance for you to find counsel.
| gambiting wrote:
| So what would happen if an American company that owns the
| .net domain sued me, a Polish citizen, who owns a .com
| domain, for that domain? My contract for the domain is
| with a Polish provider, surely it would have to go
| through a Polish court, no?
| voakbasda wrote:
| Conclusion: only the lawyers ever win.
| ericb wrote:
| Not a lawyer, but...
|
| If OP has first use in commerce that predates theirs they could
| start, or threaten to start, the paperwork to have the
| trademark tossed. If they see you are asking questions that
| aren't a response to bullying, but that would precede a legal
| an attack their trademark directly, they might find themselves
| on a different footing.
|
| Regardless, the possibility, I would think puts you in a better
| negotiating position if you're looking for an offer, or just
| want to make them go away.
|
| Seeing a lawyer is likely the way to go. Also, I notice you use
| the term "solicitor" which makes me think any US law-based
| answers are less likely to be grounded in reality for you, so
| add more than your usual pinch of salt to anything you see
| here, including what I wrote!
| firekvz wrote:
| You were 1st, you are all good
|
| UDPR is your friend
| sumoboy wrote:
| UDPR is definitely your friend. Your domain info should have
| been private anyways, too late now. One question is what
| content do you have on the domain today and does it
| relate/similar to the .net domain? If your .com is being used
| for something beyond a parking page, the .net don't really have
| a chance so let them file a UDPR.
| arrty88 wrote:
| Publish this letter on your domain and point at the evil "big co"
| gumby wrote:
| As you said "solicitor" I'm guessing you're not in the USA.
|
| If you are in the USA, the law is on your side: just because they
| registered the mark doesn't take away your rights.
|
| In addition, if they are doing something different from you (or
| perhaps you're using the domain for non-business purposes) they
| have no claim. You can open McDonald's garden shop (even if your
| name isn't McDonald) and unless you made it look like a
| McDonald's restaurant (trying to cause confusion) it's none of
| the restaurant company's business.
|
| Best, unfortunately, is to get a lawyer. If your country has a
| "small claims" court you could even sue them to get back your
| lawyer costs, but those are likely to be small in any case.
|
| Good luck!
| ksec wrote:
| >As you said "solicitor" I'm guessing you're not in the USA.
|
| But then they use Pacific Time Zone.
| [deleted]
| phonebanshee wrote:
| Which makes it a very good bet that they're Canadian.
| unfocused wrote:
| No. It looks like they live in South Australia from a
| previous comment of theirs:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25174647
|
| Solicitor doesn't necessarily mean Canada.
| tomxor wrote:
| Correct, they live in Australia (it's in their comment
| history)
| kohanz wrote:
| Not really a dead giveaway. Lawyer is the more commonly-
| used term in Canada too.
| verve_rat wrote:
| No, the letter they got sent uses Pacific Time. The dicks
| couldn't even be bothered translating that into the time zone
| of their target, or even UTC.
| niij wrote:
| HN is not the place to ask for legal advice. Just because it
| tangentially relates to technology does not mean it belongs here.
|
| In any case: asking for legal advice without even providing a the
| jurisdiction(s) or details is a waste of time.
| elmerfud wrote:
| Talk to a lawyer and be prepared to spend money if you want to
| keep it.
|
| First use is a strong defense, but you will need to defend it. If
| you have similar products and can show first use, as you claim,
| perhaps negotiating a sale of your entire business including the
| domain would be something to offer them.
|
| Usually this kind of tactic happens because they've looked at you
| and guessed you don't have financial capital to defend yourself.
| Unfortunately, because it's very difficult to prove they're
| acting in bad faith, there's likely no way to recover your costs
| of defense.
| Terry_Roll wrote:
| Dont know what country you live in but check the categories the
| trademark was linked to. If they are in the same line of business
| as you and the TM has that category that covers the line of
| business you are in I would be questioning the trademarks office
| for awarding the TM to the other entity.
|
| TM's are cheap so its an easy trick and a lawyers letter doesn't
| cost much either, but its a legal game you may well be forced to
| play, because they might go to the domain registrar and try it on
| with them to get your domain.
|
| Unfortunately these are the additional cost we can be forced into
| playing if someone with more money wants something from you like
| in this case your .com name. You could also see if your domain
| registrar as some sort of arbitration which could keep costs down
| or lower than using a lawyer. I think divorce lawyers best
| typifies some of them thrive on disputes. Good luck!
| throwsdfsf wrote:
| Name and shame the Founders.
|
| There is a huge community of domainers on Twitter. There will be
| blowback. You will get tons of support, and recommendations. (as
| well as guidance on lawyers...etc).
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