Latest news of the domain name industry

Recent Posts

Cheaters’ dating site wins 101 typo domains

Kevin Murphy, May 17, 2010, Domain Policy

You’d think a web site that enables married people to cheat on their partners would have difficulty taking the moral high ground on any issue. Apparently not.
AshleyMadison.com, which offers an “Affairs Guaranteed” promise, has just won 101 typo domain names under a mass UDRP claim against a single respondent.
The disputed domains included everything from zashleymadison.com to aeshleymadison.com. Two were PPC pages, the remainder apparently remained unused.
Judging from the National Arbitration Forum decision, this was an open-and-shut case of typosquatting.
The registrant was hiding behind a Bahamas-based privacy service that declined to close his true identity.
He did not respond to the UDRP filing.

Richard Dawkins files UDRP claim for richarddawkins.com?

Kevin Murphy, April 8, 2010, Domain Policy

Biologist Richard Dawkins, perhaps the planet’s most famous and controversial atheist, has apparently filed a UDRP claim for richarddawkins.com.
The domain, which is down, is registered to a New Jersey address. For the last 10 years, up until at least a week ago, it has sold Dawkins’ books via Amazon’s affiliate program.
The UDRP case was filed with the National Arbitration Forum yesterday. The parties to the case are not yet listed.
Dawkins’ official web site is hosted at richarddawkins.net.
Interestingly, richarddawkins.org is owned by the loopy creationist group Access Research Network. ARN’s page incorrectly points visitors to richarddawkins.com if they want the “official” site.
Dawkins may have a struggle on his hands. Celebrity cybersquatting cases are rarely straightforward, and he may have trouble proving both trademark rights and bad faith.
Better knock on wood, Richard.