Slashdot Mirror
Unsolicited Offer For My Personal Domain Name?
Batzerto writes "Last Friday I received an unsolicited email offer for my domain — click the link below for the message. Their company name matches my domain, but with a country-specific top level domain (.NL in this case). They do seem to be legitimately using the domain in their country. As for my usage, the domain is my last name(.COM) and I'm only really using it for email. I'm not really that attached to it other than the hassle of changing email addresses. There are other flavors of the domain available (.US for example) that would suit my purposes just fine. So, Slashdot veterans, I ask you, what should I do? I'm leery of making an offer and falling into someone's legal trap. I wouldn't mind getting a chunk of cash out of the deal though."
From: ---
Sent: Friday, August 29, 2008 4:56 AM
To: ---
Subject: sell your domain ?
Dear Sir,
For my company I need the domain --- .
Is it possible to sell your domain to me?
Best Regards
N. de Robles
From: ---
Sent: Friday, August 29, 2008 4:56 AM
To: ---
Subject: sell your domain ?
Dear Sir,
For my company I need the domain --- .
Is it possible to sell your domain to me?
Best Regards
N. de Robles
Can they accuse you of domainsquatting if you ask for money or something like that?
Seems like I've heard similar horror stories of people losing their domains because they asked someone to make an offer.
There is a war going on for your mind.
You should see them quadruple their offer then. It's called hardball.
Or they bring out the lawyers and everybody loses. It wouldn't be the first time, either.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
This is a trademark issue. If you ask for money for a domain name that includes their trademark, then they have a legal case against you for domain squatting.
In the end, like most ask slashdot posts, the submitter should go to a lawyer and ask their opinion. The company's offering to buy it, so I don't see any reason that the submitter shouldn't be able to legally ask what price they're willing to pay, but I don't know the particulars of the law.
I think this is the website in question.
Don't know if I crossed a line, but it took all of 1 second on the google.
If they do give you an offer that you like and you wish to sell, I would recommend using an escrow service. This will protect you from being scammed out of your domain name and getting the agreed amount. Unfortunately, most escrow services aren't cheap as they usually take a percentage of the selling price or have some graded-scale based on the sell price.
Well, you can just write them a polite email informing that you use the domain and it is not up for sale. However if they really need the domain, and are willing to recompensate you for the hassle of moving to another domain, you would be willing to help them out.
That way they can make an offer, are you get into no legal trouble (You clearly show that you do not wish to sell the domain, unless it is to help them out).
No. The submitter has a legitimate cause to use this domain name. He's also free to sell it to anyone at whatever price he/she wishes.
It's mikerowsoft.com all over again.
if you show that you're interested in taking money for the domain name, they will then use that as an argument during legal proceedings that you're a domain name squatter.
I'm no lawyer, but that sounds like a pretty flimsy legal argument. (Which doesn't mean someone won't try and use it in court--but I just doubt it would stand up.)
Lots of people have sold domain names in the past, and even advertised them for sale. People even buy domain names speculatively and sell them later. All of this is legal and not "squatting". The nasty stuff is typo-squatting, or otherwise intentionally confusing consumers. Sitting on a domain name that most people would assume points to a particular company can sometimes fall into this category.
In this case, the submitter indicated that the domain name is his last-name. That sounds like a pretty solid defense in any court against the squatting argument. In terms of any squatting or trademark dispute, his claim (last name) is equally valid to the company's claim (company name).
My inclination would be to just come up with a fair price, and then tell them that you are actively using the domain, but would be willing to sell it to them for $X. Either they accept or they don't. I doubt this is an attempt to trick him. (Then again, maybe I'm a naive glass-half-full kind of person.)
I recently sold my domain to a french company that reached me in a similar way. I told them i had no interest in selling the domain as I use it for personal and business reasons. I told them if they wanted to buy my company, then to make a reasonable offer (but again I had no interest in selling the domain at this time).
They provided a very attractive offer and I did end up selling the domain. They simply redirect the .com to their french site. I got 6 months of email forwarding.
My experience was good, but that does not seem to be what people here are saying...
Which one is the law enforcement officer?
Oh, right. Not entrapment.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?
Another installment in the ongoing saga, "Why no one should ever, ever, ever Ask Slashdot".
BTW, there is no URL. The domain in question is email only. So there's nothing to SEO. Kthxbye.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Correct me if i'm wrong, But i think entrapment only applies to police.
"Entrapment is the act of **a law enforcement agent** in inducing a person to commit an offence which the person would not have, or was unlikely to have, otherwise committed"
Depends on the name & the country. McD's doesn't push trademark restrictions too hard in the UK because Lord McDonald of McDonald told them to lay off or else. In some places, a person's name wins every time. In the US it depends on timing & scope. However, in most instances, trademark violations have to show the potential for confusion - with few exceptions, a personal website cannot be easily confused with a corporate homepage.
In terms of squatting, it would depend, since he's using & has been using the domain for email - the presence or absence of a website is irrelevant to squatting. Showing active use of the domain for some purpose other than ad-parking is usually sufficient to kill a squatting complaint.
There is an exception to this which is valid in this case. The trademark in question (if it is a trademark, as the submission is not explicit here), is the last name of the person owning the domain. In this case, the last name should take precedence over the trademark unless it was registered "in bad faith".
It appears that the Respondent registered the Domain Name in order to be identified by his surname, in line therefore with the provision of paragraph 4(c)(ii) of the Policy.[...]The use of one's own surname in a domain name corresponds to a legitimate customary practice and is, as a rule, sufficient evidence of a legitimate right or interest in the domain name. The scope of the Policy is limited to cybersquatting. Trademark owners shall not be allowed to use the Policy to dispossess summarily a third party of a domain name reflecting his or her surname (G.A. Modefine S.A. v. A. R. Mani, WIPO Case No.D2001-0537).
Actually the style of the email and the grammatical errors are very Dinglish. (Dutch + English). Especially the closing and the way he signed his full (first initial last name). Most dutch people rarely include their full first name in correspondence, usually using only their first few initials. This is proper business etiquette. On the flip side, in the news, the first name last initial is commonly used to "anonymously" name suspected criminals who want to stay anon, for example Ali G.
Seeing as he comes from .nl - at least that part is legit.
In all correspondence I'd use the term transfer in place of sell.
Where have you been living? For a mere $1,200, a company can file for arbitration and stands a good chance of the arbitrator finding in favor of them.
IANAL, but I believe much of the argument depends on when and why you registered the name. If your last name was "Scion" and you had registered "scion.com" back in 1992, AND for the last 15 years it had been your personal home page and email address, then Toyota probably wouldn't be able to accuse you of squatting.
But if you registered "scion.com" just after you learned that Toyota was starting a new nameplate, and you filled the page with links to various car-related websites, then you don't have nearly as much of a leg to stand on. IIRC, Mr. Nissan had registered his domain name early, but the website was seemingly designed to make money off of people who assumed "nissan.com" was the car company. Reserving your name is OK, but trying to confuse the customers of a mega-corporation with mega-lawyers is a risky gambit.
I always thought the classiest act was the guy who owned delta.com back in the 90s. I forget what the company was (a little consulting shop, maybe?), but right on his front page he had links to Delta Airlines, Delta Dental, Delta Faucets, and Delta Power Tools for people who had done an "address-bar search".
Several years ago I registered a domain name for something I was trying which I was thinking about. Some guy, whose last name was the same as the domain I registered asked me if I'd be interested in selling it. Well, I needed the money so I quoted a reasonable offer. After the check cleared I did a change of the owner from me to him.
I took his personal check because he was in the U.S., the rules are very different when it's an international transaction. (I once paid for a shareware registration to a guy in Canada using a personal check drawn on a U.S. bank, I presume Canadian banks have no problem handling those; but I wouldn't accept anything but a guaranteed payment for an international transaction.)
Since the possibility of fraud is high when the buyer is outside the same country (on low value transactions where there's no money to chase them if you can't recover it), you make sure it's a guaranteed payment. I would suggest either wire transfer (and make sure the payment additionally includes your bank's incoming wire transfer fee) or Western Union for the same reason scammers use them: so the money is guaranteed and can't be revoked or a fraudulent transfer such as a forged check. Especially since the funds transfer is from a foreign country, it might cost you $30 or more to clear a check issued on a bank in some other country, presuming you don't get the check back in six or eight weeks as a forgery. If they want a written bill of sale or something, fine. But you get guaranteed payment before they get the domain.
Another option if the amount of the sale is not over the limit: set up a new, fresh account using Paypal or Google Checkout that goes to a new checking account at a bank (other than the one you do business with now) that will allow you to open one with no monthly fee (and check the paperwork they give you, sometimes they sneak fees in there), then, once the transfer clears, take all the money out except a token amount ($1) in cash, and then deposit the cash in your other account. Or close the account as you no longer need it.
This way, they can't undo the transaction and you've got the cash. Even if they try to reverse the transaction, the bank can't reverse it because you didn't use paper; if you took a bank check from them they could reverse the payment to your bank. Also you don't want to use the same bank as your own because they can use set off if the other side tries to renege on the transaction.
In fact, if they are going to use wire transfer, use a new account because I suspect the information needed for an incoming wire is the same as could be used for an outgoing one, and they might be able to siphon money out of your account. Or check with your bank to find out how to have a wire transfer that doesn't allow them to extract money from you, but I think wire transfers are ridiculous because of the fact that your bank charges you for the incoming transfer as well.
Automatic red flag: if they offer you more and want you to arrange something to send them money back. 99.9999999999999999999999999999999% of the time it's a scam for them to rip someone else off and leave you on the hook to make the person they stole from whole, since they can't be found, but you can.
I just went and looked it up for an example transaction, a Western Union transfer of $1,000 from Netherlands to the U.S. is about 711 Euros and costs around 41 Euros for the transaction, probably less than it would cost them for both ends of a wire transfer. If you're charging less than $1000 for the domain, the transfer fee to them will probably be less.
If you do these things and the transaction goes through, it hasn't cost you anything but a little time and you've protected yourself.
Otherwise it's no different from selling anything you own to someone else. A domain name has a registered owner, you transfer the registration to someone else, they own it. Most personal property doesn't have registered owners, if you sell something they just t
The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that nobody learns the lessons that history teaches us.
And I would certainly mention that you own it because it is your name.
That didn't work too well for Mike Rowe, of Mike Rowe Software. It was genuinely his name, but a certain agressive trademark defender made him give up his domain. (Ref:JFGI)
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
You should solidify your ownership of the domain immediately, and consider specifics about offers, etc. later.
I had an interesting challenge to my ownership of the Chaco.com domain. We were using it legitimately to host material on Chaco Canyon, as well as hosting our MUD client (formerly owned by our company Chaco Communications). And yet, we were challenged by Chaco Sandals. The challenge was close; we almost lost the domain, just because we were a little sloppy.
The details are here:
http://domains.adrforum.com/domains/decisions/791739.htm
Based on my experience, I would suggest that you get all the domain ownership issues in a solid form: Use your own name, make sure the addresses are correct and usable, don't use a "privacy filter" like GoDaddy sells to hide your identity.
Good luck.
You should see them quadruple their offer then. It's called hardball.
Or they bring out the lawyers and everybody loses. It wouldn't be the first time, either.
I think this link is more informative about the nissan.com issue.
$ make available
And not if his name is the same as theirs. I can open a store called "Paul Robinson's Department Store" and the currently existing Robinson's Department Store (actually J.W. Robinson or Robinson-May depending on what part of the U.S. they're in) chain has no grounds to stop me (especially if I included the note "Not affiliated with the J.W. Robinson Co." on the entrance door of my store); one may always use one's birth name (or married name in the case of a woman, since men don't change their names when they get married) to do business even if it is identical to an existing company in the same line of business
This is not true. If you use a name that is confusingly similar to another's trademark, the fact that it is your own name does not make it okay. The whole point of trademark is to enable consumer's to identify the source of goods and services based on a known mark. If everybody with the last name of McDonald was able to open a burger joint called "McDonald's," that purpose would be frustrated. Consumers would be confused because they wouldn't know if this McDonald's was going to sell them a low-quality slapped-together microwaved piece of McCrap, or if this one happened to be some mom-and-pop knockoff instead.
As for the domain name, if it's not that important, sell it. If they make a legitimate offer (like "We will buy your domain for $X") and you accept it, you have a contract. They can't then go to a court and say, "Look, he's trying to fleece us." (But that's not legal advice. Hire a lawyer)
Today's Sesame Street was brought to you by the number e.
> however, men /can/ change their names when they get married
Men can change their names at any time, for any reason, the same as with women. Women just tend to do it on a particular occasion.
They can also live under an assumed name, so long as no fraud is intended. John Wayne never legally changed his name from Marion Morrison, for instance; he just stopped using it.
All of which is irrelevant to accusations of domain squatting, given that it has been his name since whenever.
I've sold three domains I was legitimately using and made a pretty nice wad of cash.
I registered a domain name about 6 years ago with the intent of starting a company that offered a service pertinent to the domain. It was a mashup of two words that I created myself. About 3 months after registering it I got an email from someone in Israel asking me if I would consider selling it. My response was along the lines of, "No, I hadn't considered selling it but so that I can compare with what I had planned to do with it, could you let me know your offer?" He came back and said $1,000. That is not a lot of money, but I had a pipeline of about 20 other web projects in front of the one I was considering for this domain so I took it.
We did an escrow.com jobby and everything worked flawlessly.
I'm a big tall mofo.
In your case, I'd state that
Without legal advice I would be very hesitant to give any non-public information. Even giving public information, that they obviously already know, *might* even be used to imply in a court, by omission, that you have no other claims to the domain. Simply fishing for more information, without making any claims, or anything that might be lost in translation as a threat Would seam safer. (IE re-stating what they already know, may sound more like a "lets fight", than "I also know what you know.")
Simply, "I have received your letter. I would be interested in receiving any information you are willing to share relating to any plans you may have relating to "mylastname.com" "
simply to get a feel for "are they legit" and "are they just fishing." before assuming anything more.
It isn't out of context. In that speech Cade is listing all the great things that will happen, come the revolution: two chickens in every pot, free beer for everybody, we'll make Friday part of the weekend and give every new baby a chocolate eclair. And the very first thing, of all these great things we're going to do, is kill all the lawyers. It means exactly what it sounds like, and Cade said it because he was a populist and he knew it was what everybody wanted to hear.
Another interesting case, if you can find the history from a decade ago, is the newton.com domain. It was owned by Mark Newton for years, and used by his small software shop, until Apple came out with the Newton and wanted the domain. Apple didn't negotiate; they just gave him the choices of giving up the domain or being bankrupted by the lawyers that Apple would sic on him. There were a few stories recently about Apple renewing the registration for newton.com, although they no longer actually use it for anything. It now just redirects to apple.com.
So companies can be nice about it, or extremely nasty, or anything in between. I wonder if the US has any more legal protection from such things now than it did 10 or 15 years ago. Probably not; the big corporations can always bankrupt the little independents.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
To do so would deny equal and unfettered access to the legal system.
It is the job of the attorney to be an advocate for a client, not to be the gatekeepers of greedy bastards and dumbasses. That's society's job, and by extension, Congress'.
the reason that we have so many ridiculous class action suits is because too many lawyers don't have better things to do.
Trust me when I say there is no shortage of work for lawyers. Ever. We'd all thank you for starting fewer legal fights and clogging the courts.
Law is probably the only line of work where the people working in the field answer only to themselves
As opposed to? Are we forgetting juries and elections, or are you just conceding that everybody else is too stupid to do anything about it?
That's like saying cops only investigate themselves, or that doctors are the only ones who can really check each other's work. It may have intuitive appeal, but it's short-sighted and unrealistic.
It's been some time since I've followed WIPO domain-name issues...
...but I think I still know the most important rules.
The deck is stacked against you. But, you can still "win" (trade your domain for some money) if you know the rules.
The most important two rules are:
(1) Be prepared to document your legitimate uses of the site.
Since you've already been contacted, it won't help you now to put a bunch of "real content" up at the site's web address. But it sounds like you've been using it for email for some time now. You may want to search mailing list archives online to find old examples of your sending legitimate emails using the domain. If any are for vaguely-business purposes, so much the better.
I don't imagine you'll need notarized statements from friends and relatives confirming that you've been emailing them from this domain for X period of time. But if this goes to a UDRP action, you may want to get them anyway!
You're already on pretty good ground here if the domain really is just your last name. But it still doesn't hurt to have documentation ready.
(2) Don't make careless offers; know what "bad faith" is.
The other company approaching you is great. You don't have to do anything, they're the ones putting themselves out there.
But if you write back and say "I'll take a million dollars for it," or "how about a hundred dollars," you're putting yourself at a little risk. The risk in both cases is that now WIPO will treat you as attempting to profit from the domain. The specific risk of making an outrageously high offer is that you can be treated as not bargaining in good faith; the specific risk of making a lowball offer is that they may accept it and you'll (in the end) have to give it up for that.
Be very cagy about even beginning the bargaining process. Instead of naming a price, or even stating your serious intent to sell, you might begin with
"I wasn't planning on selling it, so I didn't have a price in mind. I'm using it and it would be inconvenient to give it up. But if you're really interested, make me an offer."
This establishes from the beginning that your purpose in originally acquiring the domain was not to profit by reselling it. In particular, not to profit by reselling it to someone who holds a trademark on the domain name -- that will definitely get it taken away from you on grounds of "bad faith." You further establish this by not stating a price, which could also be taken as evidence of bad faith.
If you get an offer that you're willing to accept, get them to send it in writing, not email, of course. Depending on how much money it is, it may be worth a trademark lawyer's fee to either draw up a quick contract or confirm that their offer is something you'd be willing to sign. (And do find a lawyer who knows something about trademark.)
If you get an offer that you're not willing to accept, do not make a counteroffer with a specific price. Don't even say you'd sell it for a higher amount. Say rather something like,
"I'm not interested in selling the domain at that price. If you'd like to make another offer, I'd be willing to consider it."
Until you have their signature on paper, your primary goal is not to do or say anything that could be taken as evidence that you have either registered or used the domain in bad faith, because that will let them simply take it away from you and you'll get nothing. And if they hold a trademark on your name, your asking for money is evidence of bad faith.
If you think you're able to bargain while following those rules, then first go read about the UDRP and get the real, formal definitions of the rules instead of my paraphrases. I'll let you google it; also, google on [udrp site:slashdot.org] for examples of how the deck has been stacked against individuals like yourself since 1999. Good luck.