Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by dangrossman 4803 days ago
> the current owners are using it in bad faith

He never says this. Merely holding a trademark does not entitle you to take a domain from someone (see: Nissan Motor Company v Nissan.com). Sitting on domains is not illegal.

1 comments

Nissan.com is a legitimate company with a legitimate purpose though.
The submission here says nothing about who owns the mystery domain except that they're willing to sell it. You don't need to be a "legitimate company with a legitimate purpose" to register domains. I own domains I only use for mailboxes; you can't take them by paying $350 to register them as trademarks. If I put a "for sale" page on the domain, that wouldn't let you take them either.

The UDRP only allows a dispute when the current owner is using the name to intentionally "attract, for commercial gain, Internet users to your web site or other on-line location, by creating a likelihood of confusion with the complainant's mark...". Or, if the domain was registered for the purpose of selling it to the trademark holder, but that's not the case since the domain wasn't registered after the trademark and the owner didn't reach out to him.

What purpose would that be? A quick visit to their site strongly suggests that a pretty important purpose of their business is to squat NISSAN.COM.
Based on their website, I'll go out on a limb and say it might have something to do with the computer company owned by one Uzi Nissan.
Based on the website, I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that less than 1% of the visitors to this site are looking for Uzi Nissan or his company. Maybe it's the giant insurance scam banner that covers more than 50% of the page that makes me think that.
This is what the guy (Uzi Nissan) claims:

http://www.digest.com/Big_Story.php

Find another legit computer business who allocates the majority of their home page to insurance ads and dropdowns with "Astrology Supplies" and "Miami Beach Condos" and I'll care what that guy thinks.