Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[schizoman]

The company I work for sells XYZ products online, via half a dozen or so URLs.  For some unknown reason, company XYZ doesn't want us to use their name in our URL even though nothing but products from XYZ are offered for sale, and the sole intent of having their name in the URL is to promote said products..

XYZ participates in no retail business.  All of our sites contain links to XYZ's home page, clearly indicating that we are NOT XYZ but rather a retailer of XYZ products.

From what little research I've done so far, XYZ has no legal standing to force us to surrender the domain names in question.  (Of course, there are non-legal pressures that they can bring to bear, but the letter that XYZ sent really ticked me off.)

Since I'm not a lawyer, I'd like to get as much input on my standpoint as I can.  Assuming the facts above, do I have a good chance of prevailing in a lawsuit and/or ICANN dispute?

Thanks.

[JSonnabend]

You may be correct that the company cannot force you to relinquish your domain.  The law, however, is not particularly clear in the situation you've described.  Principles of nominative use should protect you, but I haven't come across any cases applying this to your disclosed facts.

By all means, if your business is important to you, I'd get a lawyer to handle the matter for you.

- Jeff