L
Life
Guest
Thanks for responding to my last post on trademarks; I am very greatful for your information.
Before domain names were in vouge, I decided to add a few names to my domian arsenal. Two of them are in the subject line and the other was jerryseinfeld.org (I think twocows owns that now).
Once I registered these domain names, I thought I had it made and decided that I would develop these sites to pay tribute to the people I found interesting in show biz. I never even thought about trademarks nor was there any buz about trademark name disputes back then.
So being the the fun loving person that I was, I decided to throw some money developing some pretty cool sites dedicated to these Hollywood stars.
A few years pass and I get this hefty letter in the mail stating that I was violating a federal trademark. :sad: I found many ways to trademark these same names in other countries on the fly in order to keep these domain names without giving them up. For a few thousand dollars, I could have held the legitimate trademark owners at bay for many years.
After reading more and more about our trademark policies, I found out that I was in the wrong and what I was attempting to do was to fight for something that didn't belong to me. It was a devestating blow to my ego especially when all I wanted to do was pay tribute to these people in my own way. I had hired three great flash programmers and my sites were much better then the current dot com's one by far. I had spent allot of time and effort getting these going but in the end I wrote the trademark owner an email and told him that he would need to send me a check for the amount that I had paid to register the domain names.
Of course I made sure he was the legitimate trademark owner and when I recieved the check I reliquished the domain names to him.
I spoke to one of his lawyers who said the same as a lawyer friend of mine who is an IP lawyer that if I had fought it, it would have cost me a minimum of $5K to even speak to a decent IP lawyer.
I also spoke to the EFF and they said that I didn't have a chance in heck if I decided to fight it. In the end, it was the right thing to do; plus this game is for people who have money to fight for what 'they' think is right in court. I'd rather just put my tail between my legs and walk home with my wallet intact. :cry:
-Life
Before domain names were in vouge, I decided to add a few names to my domian arsenal. Two of them are in the subject line and the other was jerryseinfeld.org (I think twocows owns that now).
Once I registered these domain names, I thought I had it made and decided that I would develop these sites to pay tribute to the people I found interesting in show biz. I never even thought about trademarks nor was there any buz about trademark name disputes back then.
So being the the fun loving person that I was, I decided to throw some money developing some pretty cool sites dedicated to these Hollywood stars.
A few years pass and I get this hefty letter in the mail stating that I was violating a federal trademark. :sad: I found many ways to trademark these same names in other countries on the fly in order to keep these domain names without giving them up. For a few thousand dollars, I could have held the legitimate trademark owners at bay for many years.
After reading more and more about our trademark policies, I found out that I was in the wrong and what I was attempting to do was to fight for something that didn't belong to me. It was a devestating blow to my ego especially when all I wanted to do was pay tribute to these people in my own way. I had hired three great flash programmers and my sites were much better then the current dot com's one by far. I had spent allot of time and effort getting these going but in the end I wrote the trademark owner an email and told him that he would need to send me a check for the amount that I had paid to register the domain names.
Of course I made sure he was the legitimate trademark owner and when I recieved the check I reliquished the domain names to him.
I spoke to one of his lawyers who said the same as a lawyer friend of mine who is an IP lawyer that if I had fought it, it would have cost me a minimum of $5K to even speak to a decent IP lawyer.
I also spoke to the EFF and they said that I didn't have a chance in heck if I decided to fight it. In the end, it was the right thing to do; plus this game is for people who have money to fight for what 'they' think is right in court. I'd rather just put my tail between my legs and walk home with my wallet intact. :cry:
-Life
