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Graduate Student Defends Right To Own Chicago2016.com

Posted by timothy on from the but-all-he-did-was-think-of-it-first-and-register-it dept.

An anonymous reader points to a story in the Chicago Tribune about another domain-name battle. Quoting the article: "As Chicago wages its battle to host the 2016 Olympics, it also finds itself scrapping over a valuable piece of cyberspace: the domain name of Chicago2016.com. The bid team along with the U.S. Olympic Committee are trying to wrest that online address from Stephen Frayne Jr., a 29-year-old MBA student. Frayne snagged it back in 2004, about two years before the bid was launched. ... 'We certainly see Chicago2016.com as the logical default domain for our site, and we believe having someone else control it is misleading for people seeking information about Chicago's bid,' said Patrick Sandusky, a spokesman for Chicago 2016, a moniker protected by trademark."

17 of 461 comments (clear)

  1. Looks Legit by SolarStorm · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This does not a case of someone trying to make a buck on the name. It looks like someone smart who registered a domain name for the purpose of discussion. The domain is not parked, not defamitory and is in use. Case closed. If this he looses his domain name, then who is next?

    1. Re:Looks Legit by RodgerDodger · · Score: 5, Interesting

      It doesn't matter. The Chicago 2016 Olympic organising committee sought their trademark 2 years after the domain name was awarded and put into use.

      McDonald's have a pattern of naming burgers with a Mc-prefix. If I started a domain named 'www.mcchocolatecake.com', and McDonald's started to offer, two years later, a McChocolate Cake, they wouldn't have a right to seize my domain. Same deal.

      --
      "Software is too expensive to build cheaply"
    2. Re:Looks Legit by GigaplexNZ · · Score: 5, Informative

      The Mc prefix is also used in Scottish naming conventions, what if someone was selling Scottish chocolate cakes online? Common patterns are not enforceable trademarks.

    3. Re:Looks Legit by houstonbofh · · Score: 5, Funny

      Oh, God. If McDonald's ever sells Hammers, I won't know who to root against!

    4. Re:Looks Legit by BitZtream · · Score: 5, Interesting

      ICANN frowns on it, but doesn't do shit about it. I HATE cybersquatters. My own domain was stolen in my opinion due to a glitch on Network Solutions part which allowed it to lapse before they even removed my name servers from the root servers, for this I am very mad. Even worse is that it is now parked, by some jackass who refuses to sell it back to me at a reasonable price. Feel free to mailbomb him, the domain is schizo.com and his information is accurate in the whois records ...

      The point to my rant anyway is that, while squatting pisses me off, it would appear that this (and other domains like it) were registered by someone who thought ahead, more than 12 years ahead in fact. He IS using the domain, and what he's using it for doesn't matter. The fact that its used for Olympic discussion doesn't matter either. He had the forsight to register it before they did. Business is all about getting the right idea before someone else, and the name really is essientially a vanity domain, they can come up with plenty of other names to use.

      So ... he's not really squatting, he's using it, and for a good purpose I think.

      To me, the name isn't something that can be considered a trademark or any thing, I can't see how a city name can be considered property and more than the word 'shoes'. A post below this as I write says 'if it was chicagoolympics2016.com they might have an argument' ... I can't see how any of the parts of the name can possibly be considered a registerable trademark, I'm not saying they aren't, I don't know, they probably are.

      But they olympics have been around far longer than trademarks and copyrights. If anything Chicago should be considered public property at best.

      While he might be taking advantage of the situation, thats all the Olympic committee does anyway, they pull shit like deals with Visa so no other cards work, which is just ridiculous and in no way something that can be considered for the good of the sport, spectators or anyone other than those who get paid by the Olympic organization.

      So in short, as someone who has been screwed out of his own domain, I cant' really say I'm sorry they were screwed out of it. He took a gamble on many names, if they really were concerned they should have registered the possiblities themselves long in advance like everyone else does. Google owns wwwgoogle.com, microsoft owns wwwmicrosoft.com, many companies have the insight to think ahead on things like this. They didn't, fuck'em.

      And really, I can't imagine they can't afford to buy it from him, they'd just rather try to strong arm him into losing it rather than dealing with the fact that they weren't planning far enough ahead.

      Just because someone is crafty enough to beat you to it doesn't mean they should be rewarded.

      Evolution, business, and pretty much everything else in nature disagrees with you. Craftiness is a very GOOD reason to be rewarded, its part of what drives innovation. Next you'll be telling us that the runner who is faster in a race than everyone else shouldn't be the winner, because its not fair to the slower people.

      I'm tired of all this 'its not fair' crap. Lifes not fair and no one even cheated the system on this one.

      Good for him. I hope he makes a fortune from it.

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    5. Re:Looks Legit by Bishop+Rook · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Though apparently American courts have ruled in favor of McDonalds several times over "Mc$WORD" businesses. While other countries appear to have (rightly) laughed them out of court. Wow our justice system is fucked.

    6. Re:Looks Legit by mysidia · · Score: 5, Interesting

      So if McDonalds named a product the McHammer, they get to forcibly take MCHammer.com on the basis of they own mc*?

      And when Apple gets to forcibly take www.ink.com, and any other site that begins with "i" just by introducing a product with that name, since they introduce i* naming.

      Here's an idea... perhaps I can trademark ".COM" and forcibly seize any domain ending in ".COM" since it contains something that looks like part of my mark.

      What the heck is more generic than a random city name followed by 4 digits?

      If I ever lived in Chicago; I might want Chicago2016.com. Perhaps to plan a party, unveiling of a new project, or event of some sort in the year 2016.

      The Olympics are not the only event of interest to a city. City names and year numbers definitely shouldn't belong to the IOC.

    7. Re:Looks Legit by milamber3 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Did you even go and look at the site? This guy did not know they would definitely want this domain, he wanted to start a site that was for discussion of the economics behind a bid for the Olympics. He's a student at a very good business school and that seems like a perfectly reasonable site for him to have created. Just because you think he wanted it for no good reason doesn't make it so.

    8. Re:Looks Legit by Drathos · · Score: 5, Funny

      Look... Me and the McDonald's people got this little misunderstanding. See, they're McDonald's... I'm McDowell's. They got the Golden Arches, mine is the Golden Arcs. They got the Big Mac, I got the Big Mick. We both got two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles and onions, but their buns have sesame seeds. My buns have no seeds.

      --
      End of line..
    9. Re:Looks Legit by alecwood · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Also used in Scottish naming conventions?!?!

      It is a Scottish naming convention, that's where it comes from. Mc or Mac = Son of

      McDonald = Son of Donald and exists as the name of a million or so people who have nothing to do with beef patties, or any other form of biological warfare

      How can you argue that a word in a language which pre-dates English can become the property of a US corporation to the exclusion of the speakers of that language and/or their descendants

      --
      Real happiness lies in the completion of work using your own brains and skills.
  2. Disconcerting. by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I can understand the notion that people who snipe domains associated with trademarks generally can't hold on to them. The idea that one can seize a domain that has been owned longer than a given trademark has existed seems downright dangerous, however.

    The notion is awfully close to essentially saying that anybody who can't afford a stable of relevant lawyers can have domain names taken at the whim of those who can, which is rather an ugly idea.

    1. Re:Disconcerting. by AKAImBatman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The idea that one can seize a domain that has been owned longer than a given trademark has existed seems downright dangerous, however.

      Not necessarily. Let's say I participated in a survey from a company attempting to decide on a new product name. (My wife actually does surveys like this, so it's not far-fetched.) Let's also say that some unscrupulous individual notes all the names, then goes to register ALL of them. The company then chooses a name based on the survey feedback, only to find that every one of their choices has been locked out. Does the company have a right to demand their domain back? (Especially if we're talking about made-up words here.) Do they have a right to demand it back if the person starts a "discussion site" on the upcoming product?

      You can see the difficulty.

      Nearly the same sort of issue happened here. This MBA speculatively registered a whole bunch of (city)(olympic year).com combinations. Unsurprisingly, he got lucky on one of them. Does that make what he did right? Does it make it right because he added a "discussion site"?

      Food for thought, anyway.

      --
      Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
    2. Re:Disconcerting. by _generica · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Hmm.

      Datsun became Nissan in 1983. If someone managed to register nissan.com "long before" then, then I say he and his flux capacitor deserve the domain name.

  3. guess they should have investigated the trademark by SuperBanana · · Score: 5, Insightful

    a spokesman for Chicago 2016, a moniker protected by trademark.

    Awww, isn't it too bad that trademarks don't give you retroactive ownership of whatever you like? Next time, check BEFORE you secure the trademark to see if it's already available. In fact, I bet they did- and just assumed they could take it over, just like how the IOC and USOC shut down everything named "olympic", even stuff that was named because said business was near a (different) Mount Olympus.

    Raise your hand if you're completely fed up with the Olympics. Raise your hand if you think it's time that the IOC/USOC-bought legislation "protecting" the Olympic "trademark" was repealed.

    --
    Please help metamoderate.
  4. Re:Add a Hyphen by dfm3 · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's an under-appreciated punctuation mark anyway.

    Fixed. Sorry, I just couldn't resist. ;-)

  5. To the City of Chicago by DavidD_CA · · Score: 5, Funny

    Dear City of Chicago,

    We regret to inform you that we have voted our 2016 Olympic Games be held at the fine city of Amsterdam, and not Chicago, IL.

    Our decision was based on many factors, and your city scored quite well on all criteria of the selection process.

    But when it came down to it, Amsterdam2016.com was actually registered to the right people.

    Sincereley,

    The Olympic Planning Task Force

    --
    -David
  6. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Informative

    Comment removed based on user account deletion