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Lapsed Domain Name Fight Ruled Upon In Australia
Zaphus writes "The Age is
reporting
that a domain name fight in Australia in which a lapsed domain name was snapped up by another group with the same initials, has been ruled OK by the arbitrator. This is despite the cause of the lapse being the registrar's for failing to process the renewal even though it was paid for. If this stands then it sets an interesting precident in Australia."
.. if the Registrar screwed up (as in this case) why should the original name holder be punished? The registrar should be fined or at least be forced to reimburse the 2nd group (the one that "hijacked" the domain) and the original owner should be granted the name.
This may go towards pushing for a "grace period" before a domain name can be snatched up by another party.
It also goes to show that if you own a domain name an renewal is up, you better make sure your registrar gets it done - even if you've already paid.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
This sounds like fairly standard law, like the law of what happens when a party in good faith purchases something that was stolen from you. Your recourse is against the thief not the purchaser. (Again, the purchase has to have been in good faith, without knowledge of the illegitimacy of the goods. Things like an excessively low price are a tip-off to bad tricks.)
:)
So the loser's recourse should be against the registrar. They may not have that opportunity, for if the registrar was smart it would have disclaimed liability for negligence in the contract to do the job in the first place. That provision could carry the day. Also, the would-be registrant should be expected to exercise due care to verify the proper registration.
Then again, I could be totally mistaken. YMMV.
So the drivers rights organization paid to renew their domain registration, but the registrar failed to process the renewal and resold the domian to the dust removal guys.
The arbitrators allow the dust removal guys to keep the registration? First of all, it's apparrent that Australian registrar is grossly negligent, and should pay to compensate the drivers rights group for their loss. It also highlights that the idea of domian name registration arbitration is broken not just here in the States, but around the world.
Finally, and most importantly, it underlines the need for people to become much more creative with domain names. Initials were cute "in the beginning," but with more and more groups competing for names, people must come up with better and ulitmately more meaningful alternatives.
Maybe. I know it sounds harsh, but it's also unfair to the innocent GFP to have it taken from them and likely not get their money back.
... unless of course they've disclaimed liability for negligence, in which case if it's important to you you should find one that doesn't. It appears here that the plaintiff was dealing with not the registrar but an independent agent, and so had a choice of agents. Etc., etc. Sometimes there's no completely happy ending, which is why people shouldn't make mistakes int he first place. So there. :)
A caution: I recited the "classic rule" which emphasizes the good title of the GFP. Naturally thw law, which is evolving, is not so simple. Lots of other rules exist, some favoring the victim outright by allowing demand and return at any time, others taking an intermediate course by setting a limitations period from the date of the purchase after which ownership is perfected. This topic gets really heated with topics like recovery of art looted by the Nazis.
A classic case is leaving your watch to be repaired, and the repairer turns around and sells it. Some cases distinguish between this case of "entrustment" where the "thief" has (temporary) title, or where the good are obtained by fraud or bad check, etc., from the outright theft, saying the purchaser from the thief can never get clear title. This seems pointlessly legalistic, because from the GFP's perspective all of these sellers are the same, and all have no real right to sell the goods. I guess the distinction is whether the victim voluntarily handed over title.
FWIW I favor the rule I stated, with careful evaluation whether the the purchaser is a GFP, and possibly with exceptions where the article is unique. Perhaps the GFP could be required to sell the item as a fair market price. I don't know.
As usual, and especially here, YMMV. I just thought the classic rule was a nice analogy, though the reality is messier and depends on what state or country you live in. ON TOPIC, I think the decision in this case was correct, looking at the justice and injustice to all parties involved at once. It's a pretty standard rule in commercial law that if you entrust a task to someone and they screw up, you sue them
Australia sets a lot of interesting precidents.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
It seems to me the finger here is being unfairly pointed at the registrar. It was a RESELLER of the registrar (the reseller was Internet Registrations Australia - famous for spamming people with fake invoice-looking renewal notices) that took payment and did not pass it on to the registrar.
It even says so in the third paragraph of the Age article.
IANAL, but with domain names "sold" for limited periods of time, at fixed costs per year, and quickly & surely lost if not renewed (and paid for again), they look like rented property to me.
It ain't exactly moral, but what legal rights does Joe's Gas Station have if the landlord doesn't let him renew the lease, then rents the location to Bob's Gas Station? How's this domain name mess any different?
(FWIW, the whole domain name thing looks totally screwed to me. Imagine losing your phone number because anyone dialing "EAST TOKYO HONDA" got connected to you. How many little roofing companies are there in just the U.S., what's special about the one who got "newroof.com", and why should folks in both LA and NYC be sent to that guy's web site? The basic idea behind the whole thing is just plain broken.)
It's easy to make up & spread cool- and credible-sounding stuff. Finding & checking hard facts is hard work.
Joe paid.
The landlord missplaced the paperwork and to top it all sold to Bob.
Ta-da!
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
The reseller was hired to perform a service, they didn't perform it and caused the customer to lose their domain. The reseller should reimburse their customer for the loss and damage.
The other group purchased the domain, which was freely available, they did nothing wrong.
The registrar who released the name did nothing wrong, they also operated under their standard rules.
I know that lawsuits are never free but is anyone else disturbed by the way in which arbitration is assigned these flat fees? The idea of being a) prevented from using the court system which has oversight and b) being forced to pay a flat fee just to get my case herd bugs me. Somehow it removes all pretense that the registrar is interested in crerating a viable system and just enforces the idea that they want money, cash up front in fact.
In this case it appears that the competing party that snapped up the expired domain had a more or less legitimate claim to it. However, there are businesses that live on buying just expired popular domains that had links to them, original content and loyal audience, and reroute them to their portals. A number of their victims are .org domains that don't have the money to arbitrate with them and that haven't registered their names as trademarks.
.org domain I was involved with was stolen, in this manner, by PopularEnterprises and redirected to netster.com. Other cases of the same behaviour by that business are documented, for example, at:
r is es+domain&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&selm=3cb271ea.0201021 239.281651c8%40posting.google.com&rnum=9
(stolen domain - fairyfloss.net)
I know this so well because an expired
http://www.mrt-wheels.com/thieves.html
(stolen domain - mrtrockcrawlers.com)
http://groups.google.com/groups?q=PopularEnterp
(stolen domain - oasis411.com)
http://archives.felisha.com/entry/000375.shtml
I suppose there isn't a chance in hell a non-profit organization could ever get its domain name back from such thieves, unless they drop it because it doesn't generate enough traffic. Still, I wonder - does anybody know if activity of businesses that grab your just expired domain because they want your traffic but have absolutely no interest in your name nor any connection with it is completely legitimate?
I don't think either the Australian Drivers' Rights Association or the Australian Dust Removalists' Association should be using a .com.au domain name.
.asn.au 2LD for Associations so if one of them can't happily accept adr.asn.au then i think its just tough shit for them.
Australia has in place a
That said, I still think the ruling sucks.
... and then there were none
Actually, Verisign will be implementing a Redemption Grace Period for com/net domains beginning on January 25, 2003. Domains that are deleted by the Registrar are given an extra 30 days to be rescued by the prior registrant.
For more info, see the post by Verisign here.