Domain Name Dispute Resolution Done Right

Jailbrekr writes "Domain Name conflicts: A happy ending (for once). The other day, I received a rather kind, yet startling ICQ message from a person who owns the company Digital Addiction Inc, asking for me to contact him regarding our use of the name Digital Addiction. As I am part owner of a gaming news site called Feed the Need: DigitalAddiction.net, I immediately thought of the hell that others have gone through with domain name disputes, and had these horrid thoughts of prolonged legal battles and being dragged through the various pseudo-legal dispute resolution processes.

"It only took us 5 minutes by phone to resolve the potential dispute.

"I was amazed, and pleasantly surprised that we were able to work out a reasonable solution (cross linking the sites). Ethan (the owner of Digital Addiction Inc.) was only concerned about individuals mistaking one site for another. No pissing match, no claim of absolute ownership of the name. No threats of legal action. He just wanted to make sure no-one got confused btw. the two sites.

"Other companies (like Mattel) can learn from Ethans example....."

Is it the lawyers?

[wls]

I wonder if the real difference between this example of a gentlemen's agreement versus other uglier disputes is just when a corporation actually has lawyers on staff.

when in doubt, ask

[eufaula]

we run a community access network and when we were setting it up the domain we wanted to use had the .com and .net taken by an ISP in the area. I called the owner of the ISP and talked to him about it. He told me that he had once owned all three but had let the .org expire for some reason or another, and that he didnt have a problem with our use of it so long as we were non-commerical. In trade, we posted a link to his service on our site and he posted one to ours on his (which we did not ask him to do and was a very nice gesture). it really worked out well and we avoided stepping on any toes. i guess the moral is ask first and you may get what you want while avoiding legal battles.

Re:Is it the lawyers?

[What He Said]

Actually, its the clients. Clients don't pay the bills of lawyers who do this stuff on their own time. And lawyers don't do it if they don't get paid.

-What He Said

How it should be done

[radja]

someone seems to have a clue. unfortunately it looks like this slashdot publicity is a little too late: digital addiction (the com one) is quitting. a pity... Oh well.. nothing else to do than wish Ethan better luck on his next venture.

//rdj

I sold mrbill.com a while back.

[www.sorehands.com]

Before I took sorehands.com, I had mrbill.com.

I ended up selling the domain for a small amount of money, an official Mr. Bill t-shirt, and agreement on some links and forwarding.

When I first was contacted, I was a little nervous so looked at the situation to prepare for battle. Though it was a good day to die, I was glad that it didn't need to come to that.

As for Mattel, it seems as they don't want to learn -- they must be taught.