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Olympic Committee Cracks Down On Domain Owners
RollingThunder writes: "The Globe and Mail has a story about the International Olympic Committee suing to have 1,800 domains removed. All the domains contain the words 'Olympic', 'Olympics', or 'Olympiad', and variations thereof like '2004olimpics.com'. Interesting that they're going after the DNS hierarchy (the lawsuit is filed in Alexandria, Va.) rather than the daunting task of going after the domain owners themselves." Wow. Maybe they could organize something where the domain owners could compete in a variety of fitness tests and games, you know, like the... Oh, never mind.
This is the domain name copyright/trademark infringement largest lawsuit I can remember. If they succeed, it will truely be a dark day for freedom and the internet. Baseball (mlb), football (nfl) and other professional sports are probably going to watch this one real close. They might be inclined to prevent 'fan sites' from throwing around their trademarked names as well. It seems that web sites are becoming the 'bootlegs' of the new millenia.
-- Moondog
I'm going to copyright my name, John. Then Im going to sue to have every else named John shot.
And then you would have to sue every bathroom user
Kilroy was here!
they don't do this because they have always zealously protected their trademarks. the corporate sponsors of the olympics (like mcdonalds) pay lots of money to use the trademarks. the olympics feels it has a responsibility to make sure that no one uses those trademarks who doesn't pay.
Think of all the special "olympic stuff" that you can get from places like mcdonalds, etc.. mcdonalds makes lots of money off that stuff.. and they give the olympics alot of money to use the logos..
it's money that's the issue.. not misrepresentation.
wish
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what can adequately be explained by stupidity: Why don't they just go after the names they actually plan on using, instead of attacking anything with olympics in it? After all, it's not like the fake names will confuse people -- they will see the web site name from marketing, on TV.
Or maybe they figured that since they were going to the DNS services anyway instead of the individual owners, they would be able to get rid of everything in one fell swoop. How canthey be that callous with other people's resources?
Friends don't let friends misuse the subjunctive.
Is that even possible with the way the DNS system is set up?
:)
No. Note the address of my web page...
So is microsoft going to start going after companies that make those clear things in walls we see out of? Everyone knows that Microsoft owns windows.. Perhaps slashdot could remove anybody that uses a slash and a dot in their domain name.... hmm, i'm seeing all sorts of usefull ideas here...
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If God Droppd Acid, Would he see People???
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
This is really pathetic. I mean, really? What does it matter? If someone types in "Olympics" in Yahoo, Google, etc., I'd say 10 to 1 that the very first web match is going to be the official site. What's there really to complain about?
Here's my problem with all this...whitehouse.gov and whitehouse.com. The two have existed now for at least four years. I am posative that if the government really wanted to, they could "pressure" whitehouse.com to change their domain name, but they don't. Why? Well, they're probably smart enough to know that they'd get some heavy fire if they did, but even so...one little mistake and some innocent kid looking up a government web site could find himself at a porn site.
So, if a government web site and a porn site can get along, why can't some stupid difference between www.olympics.com and www.olympics24_7.com?
I wouldn't need any permission from Lord McDonald to open such a restaurant in the US. He has no legal grounds to stop me. McDonald's Corporation would, however, put a stop to it real quick. I doubt I could open a McDonald's laundromat without facing their lawyers.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Around here, in Seattle, we have the Olympic mountains to the west of us. A few years back, the IOC was running around here threatening to sue anyone who used the work Olympic in their business. I don't know if they ever pressured the Olympic National Park to change their name, but nothing much came of it that I heard of - still plenty of businesses with Olympic in their name around here.
Hmmm. The city of Olympia, Washington is gonna have to rename itself if they want a web page. And Olympia Dukakis, watch out ...
Network Soluation and the other register services are just clearing houses. There is no reason for this. The ICO has got to realize that the word Olympic is almost getting so popular that it can't be protected with such vigur.
You nitwit. Prior Art is only even a meaningful term for patents. This is a trademark issue, and a misapplication of that.
Trees can't go dancing
So do them a big favor
Pretend dancing stinks!
I hope they get laughed out of court.
Topher
Got Freedom?
We're talking about the people who won't let you use footage of *yourself* competing for less than $1000/second... even though they've never shown the footage to anyone, and nobody ever saw you win your medal. They're cutting back numbers in most sports (particularly those with weight classes, like wrestling, weightlifting, judo and taekwondo), so that they can economicially keep including more sports (like synchronized swimming and fscking ballroom dancing), for media reasons. Similarly, countries must now qualify their athletes, if they want to compete in the games. Of course they still talk about de Coubertain's vision... "The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle."
Anyway, that's the IOC's up to on the surface. I won't go into the corruption stuff, since I can't substantiate it... I just saw a lot of it, and heard about a lot more. Suffice it to say that the bribery scandals weren't much of a shock. The amusing thing was, just as they were going on, the USOC was cutting back towel service for the OTC athletes, due to lack of funding. Scumbags. They're worse than the NCAA, and that's saying something.
Anyway, no, this is a huge moneymaking organization which certainly doesn't give a damn about anyone else's resources. Heck, they even warned us not to use the rings on our web pages or fundraising stuff. This sort of thing is very typical of them; it's not stupidity.
"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." - Alexander Hamilton
Eric
How can the Olympic Commitee claim to own the word Olympic? It's been part of the english (and other languages) lexicon since before english even existed
I remember when Zilog started sending threatening letters to any computer company that had the letter Z in its name, claiming that it it infringed on their corporate identity (they were best known for their Z80 processor), or some such nonsense. I seriously doubt that they'd have prevailed in most cases, but few wanted the costs of taking on a major corporation (backed by Exxon, incidentally), so they had to rename their companies. The point being, they don't necessarily have to have a valid legal case, they can use the intimidation factor to get their way.
------------ ...
And now, live from Utah, the capital for Olympic (TM) bullshit
from the same award winning team that brought you bribery, illegal scholarships, collapsing buildings and corrupt Olympic (TM) officials, its "Get your damn hands off of my name"
*clap*clap*clap*
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But seriously folks, be glad you don't live here in Salt Lake City, we have to put up with this hipocracy daily. They lie cheat and steal to get the Olympics here, but now that they have it, they will be angry if anyone butts in.... I am truely, truely sorry that you all have to watch the 2002 winter olymipics in your own country be so throughly screwed up. I really am.
You know, I agree with their restriction against people using the 5 rings. Thats their defining symbol, they should be allowed to use it. But going after the world "olympic"???? Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't olympic mean more than "2 week long corporate sponsoring orgy?" I am pretty sure it also means "grandious" (as in the Olympia Mountains as someone has previously mentioned).
Seriously now... the USOC and the IOC and the SLOC (Salt Lake Olympic (TM) Committee) have f*cked up enough. Save your dignity and have some respect for what the Olympics are really about.
Do you have Linux and a DotPal? Click here now!
But Olympic had been in common use, the only reason it was able to be trademarked was through a specific act of congress, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread.
For instance no matter how much money I pour into branding a drink called Water, I can't get trademark rights to it. This is why AMD comes up with lame names for its products like the Duron, so that they can create a branded product with trademark protection.
A trademark can only be retained indefinately if it retains its uniqueness, which if it enters the common vernacular (as was the case with the specific examples above) you lose it. This generally means if your brand becomes associated with an entire class of products you will end up losing your trademark.
But you are correct that it is not the same as patents or copyrights, but in any normal sense the olympic trademark would have been denied because the term had been in common usage for centuries.
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I did something call Science Olympiad. Are they treading on toes. I guess they can't have a website either. It would be so cool too, you know how much work geek high school students put into a website.
Kate
_________________________ Visit me at http://pornforcomputers.com
"This is clearly wrong. We are going to continue going after these cybersquatters for three main reasons," Mr. Pound added. "One, we don't want people making profit from Olympic trademarks that does not get returned to the athletes in some way. Two, we don't want consumers duped into purchasing items they think are Olympic-related when they are not. Three, we need to protect the values of the Olympic Movement against uses out there that are clearly illicit."
IMHO, it might be good to steer clear of everyone in the Olympic Committee for a while. The Greek Gods never had good aim with those lightning bolts.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
cellophane
escalator
thermos
nylon
harmonica
linoleum
trampoline
yo-yo
zipper
Here's a link and here's another.
So the question is did the Olympics become common usage or has the modern olympic commite reinstated the mark's value through their promotion, and thus should get exclusive use of the mark. Aparently the people who assign trademarks felt they had a valid mark (but its equally possible they were wrong).
However, trademarks are only protected for use in trade and aren't ment to stop free expression. Thus you should be able to set up a non-profit site like www.theolympicssuck.org and they shouldn't be able to stop you. OTOH the intent and the implementation of the law often aren't the same.
Always be aware of the basic rule of the road, you may be in the right but do you really want to try to prove it by stepping into a crosswalk in front of the speeding truck?
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I used to work at a little ISP called Olympic Net in 1995 when the same thing happened. They had to give up their entire domain name and are now called "Silverlink". Where do we live? We live at the base of the Olympic Mountains in Washington State (who's capital is named Olympia). We asked why they weren't pursuing all of the local companies with Olympic in their name and they said that the Internet was international.
We were just a small ISP at the time and there's no way we could have fought it so we just caved. The most irritating thing was that I checked "olympic.net" a few years later and it was being used by "Olympic Paints".
--
Quantum Linux Laboratories - Accelerating Business with Linux
* Education
* Integration
* Support
*Condense fact from the vapor of nuance*
Don't worry about the organizers of the "Special Olympics" and the "Science Olympiad" - they have permission.
Damn, I was hoping that they'd try to sue the Special Olympics so that entire IOC would be immediately tarred and feathered, putting a just yet comical end to this utter bullshit.
It would bring new meaning to the phrase "international community" when representatives of every nation on the planet compete at outdoing each other in expressing moral outrage at those who bring lawsuits against disabled children.
- bridgette
Oh, and did I mention? .... everyone will have to compete naked .... that whould keep the NBCs of the world away .....
Heck, the IOC would have huge legal fees if they had 1800 cases against the domain holders. I would think the individuals could intimidate IOC if they threatened to force IOC to bring suits against 1800 people. Which would probably force the IOC to trim the number down to just a few most important/rich/press-attention-getting domains.
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This whole thing is about as lame as having the term Realtor trademarked...
The generic term for REALTOR® is "real estate agent." But "Olympic" itself is a semi-generic term that can also mean "near or pertaining to Mount Olympus or any other similarly named mountains." (Fully generic terms are not protected under US trademark law.) And doesn't trademark law have separate "spheres" of trademark rights? (Sports is one sphere; pizza is another sphere; etc.)
<O
( \
Will I retire or break 10K?
While it seems ridiculous to claim a trademark over a word that's thousands of years old, this case is specifically empowered by Congress. The US olympic committee (and I guess by extention the IOC) were given the trademark rights to the word Olympic (despite its very common use) by Congress a something like fifty years ago. So it's actually very likely that this will stand up in court. I think a really interesting question is the one of the remedies the olympic committee is seeking. They seem to want Network Solutions to use a filter to automatically reject any registration with the words olympic in it. This seems pretty extreme and is the part of the suit I'd really like (and expect) to see thrown out.
There are many, many sites that have legitimate claim to a domain with "Olympic" in the name. The exceptions are those that use "Olympic" or one of its derivations to leech off the IOC's reputation, and I think Olympicsex might qualify there. Still, there is a very good argument that the term is so widely used, and since the term was originated thousands of years ago, that it may rightly be public domain.
Regardless of whether or not these points are valid, this kind of thing MUST be handled on a case-by-case basis. That's how the American legal system works.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
Molog
So Linus, what are we doing tonight?
So Linus, what are we going to do tonight?
The same thing we do every night Tux. Try to take over the world!
they cant exactly sue the domain operators, since they dont own the domains :)
:)
NSI set themselves up to be sued... remember how everyone was/is mad at them for saying that they OWN all domain names? well, now it's comming back to bite them in the asses
In 108 years, the Olympic Committee seems to have forgotten that the very spirit and name of the olympics was lifted wholesale from the ancient games. It's not as if they obtained rights to the term in a legal transaction with the original trademark owners.
They could use the term 'olympics' for the modern game because it was already in the three-thousand year old public domain. Just because the modern incarnation has been around for a century and has become high profile doesn't give them a magical right to take the trademark out of the public domain!
Going after others that use the name in the spirit of the original games (science olympiad, special olympics, etc.) is admitting that the modern olympics shouldn't have had the right to use the name for the past century!
Kevin Fox
Kevin Fox
At the conclusion of the Gay Games this past month in Amsterdam, an ancient question arose. Why can't the Gay Games be the Gay Olympics? Many participants seemed to be perturbed that the games were being unfairly made to refrain from the use of the word Olympic.
The answer has it's historic roots in decisions made by the resurrectors of the Olympic Games over 100 years ago. No games has been singled out or treated differently. The IOC has since it's beginnings held steadfast in it's opinion that the word Olympic be used for the Olympic Games alone, the Special Olympics being the one exception.
In 1913, Japan, China and the Philippines established a regional games which were called the "First Asian Olympic Games". The name was changed to the Far East Championships for all subsequent editions.
When Alice Milliat, the founder of the Federation Sportive Feminine International, wanted to establish events for women in 1922, she called her games the Jeux Olympiques Feminins. Pierre de Coubertin and the IAAF took notice. A compromise of sorts was agreed to. The FSFI would drop the use of the word Olympic, and the IOC would admit women into it's games.
In 1923 Frenchman Jean Petitjean was promoting his first games for university students as the University Olympic Games. De Coubertin again protested and convinced him to change the name. The International University Games were established, and are know known around the world as the World University Games, World Student Games or Universiade.
More recently the Huntsman World Senior Games were inaugurated in 1987 as the World Senior Olympics, but were made to change their name to the World Senior Games the following year.
Various Police and Fire Olympics have been asked to refrain from using the word Olympic to describe their events.
The case involving the Gay Games (International Olympic Committee vs. San Francisco Arts and Athletics, 781 F. 2d 733) was decided in January of 1986.
So what about the Special Olympics? The Special Olympics were begun by Eunice Kennedy Shriver in 1968. The use of the word Olympic by her organization was addressed by the USOC in 1971. At that time the USOC gave it's approval for the Special Olympics to be the exception to the rule and the only organization outside the Olympic movement with permission to use the word Olympic. This permission would be expanded in 1988 when the IOC recognized and endorsed the Special Olympics movement.
In this context the lawsuit between the IOC and the Gay Games in the early 80s becomes just one of many instances in which the IOC has asked organizations to reserve the use of the word Olympic for the Olympic Games.
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And, for those of you that want to know, fucktheolympics.com, fucktheioc.com, and olympicdoghumping.com are all available.
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow. - Cmdr. Susan Ivanova
Well, the domain name thing is new... I unfortunately, had to suffer through the 88 winter olympics as a resident Calgarian... Naturally, a lot of small businesses got warnings about their naming choices including one Greek restaurant owner who grew up 10 mi. from mount Olympus (no, not the one on mars). My fave of all time, though, was the Salvation Army's silhouette billboard campaign that featured one particular piece of artwork that the IOC claimed "looked" too much like a bobsled logo. The artwork in question featured a person in a wheelchair. If you can mistake a wheelchair for a bobsled, then you're suitably out of touch with winter sports that your mindshare shouldn't really matter to the IOC.
2 1337 4 u!
Personally, I don't give a rats ass about the olympics. I would rather be out participating in a sport than watching it in some tramped up production put on by scoundrels.
But, that is just my humble opinion.
The middle mind speaks!
Arrgh.
sulli
sulli
RTFJ.
SpecialOlympics.org is going to be pretty fucked. Maybe the Olympic Comittie should push some of those wheelchairs down the stairs while they're at it...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I think organizations that attempt to have domains pulled should have to post a bond to cover the owner's costs if the owner prevails. Right now, you're looking at a costly legal fight that penalizes you even if you win. Companies and others use this to intimidate innocent targets into backing down.
Last I checked, the word Olympic belongs to the Greek language, and not to the IOC.
This is about as ridiculous as Amazon's attempt to patent one-click buying.
Maybe I'll form a pizza-cooperative and begin suing pizza-hut, papa john's, etc...
gitm
- The pen is mightier than the sword, the court is mightier than the pen, and the sword is mightier than the court.
How can the Olympic Commitee claim to own the word Olympic? It's been part of the english (and other languages) lexicon since before english even existed, and I imagine it was in use for a heck of a long time before the Olympics were ressurrected during the last century.
This is another example of shoddy copyright protection, and it unfortunately puts the burden of proof on the accused (the people with the domains) instead of the accusers, due to the way the commission is doing this.
So, what's next, do they start forbidding the sale of commemorative Wheaties boxes with Mary Lou Rhetton on them? Maybe they'll sue all the sites with action based names like jump.com and runner.com and swim.org because they refer to activities that occur at the Olympics.
Well, the NFL Players Association said that Gridiron.com can't use players' names on their web site. Additionally, a site called NFLToday.com (and .net, and .org) was slapped down by the NFL. And the New York Yankees didn't like a man who had newyorkyankees.com.
These and more from Domain Diaries, brought to my attention through Google.
For more information, click here.
So, the word itself refers to the Olympic games, and there is no reference to other uses.
Actually, Webster's dictionary sold the rights to the definition. Hey, with their dictionary freely available online, they've got to have some kind of "business model", right? Why not sell the right to modify the meanings of words? Microsoft could define 'internet' as 'MSN'. Coke could pay to have the metallurgical meanings of their name removed from the dictionary.
My point, all kidding aside, is that the dictionary is hardly the place you want to be looking for establishing who is the rightful owner of anything. Dictionaries describe language use, they don't *prescribe* it. At most one could argue that they do a little of both. In neither case are dictionaries authoritative in a legal sense. If they were authoritative, no one could trademark any words because to do so would fail to fully conform to the 'canonical' use of the word. In other words, you imply that in order to qualify as a *potential* trademark, any commercial use of a word must conform to the dictionary-defined usage. I find such a proposition ludicrous at best.
Dictionaries can be corrupted and bent to serve a nefarious purpose just like any other human institution. When it comes to dictionaries, it seems as if we are still stuck with the 18th Century's optimism about objectivity, despite showing considerable cynicism about absolute truth in other matters.
Forgive me, but I can't seem to find the section of the constitution regarding "granting exclusive use of english words to a single organization". I do remember some bit about inventors and creative works and stuff, but nothing about "give us money for whatever law you want".
Yep, just reread that section, and guess what: It's not there. The closest congress comes is regulation of interstate trade, which the current supreme court actually thinks means "interstate trade", as opposed to congress's "whatever the hell we want". Trademark is protection against fraud. This law granting exclusive use of this word to a single organization is not about protecting against fraud, and isn't about anything congress is empowered to do.
When they were here in Atlanta in 1996, they had every store with a name similar to "Olympic" change its name. The local news profiled one small cafe' with the name something like "Olympic Cafe" that had been in business for over ten years. They changed their name to avoid the suit. Typical strong arm tactics. It would seem that a trademark like "Olympic" would be sufficiently diluted after, oh, 2500 years...
-tim
Hey, it could be worse, you could be in Sydney.
It's so bad over here that one of Australia's top rating shows is The Games, a mockumentary satirising the Sydney Olympics' organisation.One of the more amusing storylines was the registration of a personal domain by a Mr. Sydney Games . . .
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Not always true. If the trademark is sufficiently famous (as decided by the court), then nobody can use it. Try opening a business called "Microsoft Burgers" and see how long it lasts.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Maybe someone can persuade Matt and Trey to let Big Gay Al have some Big Gay Olympics, just to piss these guys off...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?