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The Internet Your Rights Online

WIPO Awards 'Sucks' Domain to Vivendi 154

Posted by michael from the yet-another-travesty dept.
Sarcasmo writes: "A WIPO Panel has decided in favor of Vivendi Universal in the dispute over VivendiUniversalSucks.com. The arguments made on Vivendi's behalf are strange, to say the least." It's so unjust as to be farcical. When the domain name holder makes a sarcastic comment that he wasn't making any money off the domain (in contrast to the lawyer who was billing a few hundred dollars per hour to handle the dispute), the esteemed Panel takes that as evidence that he wants to sell the domain (which in itself was already a flimsy plank to call "bad faith"). Kangaroo court is too kind a description. ICANN is currently asking for input on the domain dispute resolution process, so if you've been a victim of the UDRP, now would be a good time to speak up.
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WIPO Awards 'Sucks' Domain to Vivendi More

WIPO Awards 'Sucks' Domain to Vivendi

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  • Time for some new domains... (Score:3, Offtopic)

    by YuppieScum ( 1096 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @12:31PM (#2578642) Journal
    I think it's time for...

    vivendiuniversalreallysucks.com

    and maybe even

    wiposucks.com

    • Re:Time for some new domains... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by psaltes ( 9811 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @12:52PM (#2578703)

      well, the com [wiposucks.com] version seems to be owned by sucks500.com, a bulliten board for complaining about things related to corporate america. Wholly appropriate considering that Vivendi probably bought this case. The version [wiposucks.org] is owned by someone upset about a previous dispute that was arbitrated by WIPO, and has a fair amount of information relevent to this case (procedures, etc). Perhaps they would be interested in putting up information on other cases as well.



      I have to wonder (conspiracy time) if WIPO wants to set up precedents to have these sites taken down, as well as ICANN itself removing anti-icann sites. (icannsucks.com is also owned by sucks500.com) In fact, there are a lot of people with a lot of money who would be happy if these sorts of sites were given more trouble than private individuals can reasonably deal with. It appears that the group which owns the two .com sites has resited some lawsuits, but how long can they last?

    • wiposucks.com is taken, but wiposucks.net isn't!

      What if you hated sucksucks.com? Then you would have to buy sucksuckssucks.com? Truely bizarre

    • A better (or at least more practical) idea: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      www.boycottvivendiuniversal.com

      whether anyone actually intends to boycott vivendi universal, that would be at least a very wise place to put the old vivendiuniversalsucks site.. watch vivendi try to take THAT one away..

    • Re:Time for some new domains... (Score:4, Funny)

      by BarefootClown ( 267581 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @02:01PM (#2578898) Homepage
      Perhaps asswipo.com?
    • http://vivendi.isverybad.com
      http://vivendiuniversal.isverybad.com

      Kindly provided by yours truly. Let Vivendi claim they have a trademark on "is", "very" or "bad".

      I registered those domains (along with "are" instead of "is", plus the .net and .org TLDs) just for cases like that.
  • Wow, that had me laughing hysterically.
    People may be confused by the "sucks" at the end of a domain, because ONE band (primus) owns PrimusSucks? That's just silly! The whole process of Domain name settlements have always been a joke, been this is a new low.

    • Re:Primus?? (Score:2, Informative)

      by reidconti ( 219106 )
      Apparently WIPO is unfamiliar with the fact that Primus is a special case. "Primus Sucks!" is considered the appropriate way of expressing your approval for the band. Nobody who likes Primus says "Primus Rules," it's always "Primus Sucks!" It's a quirk. Not an arguement in favor of handing -sucks domains over to the owner of the copyright that is being criticized.
  • Does this surprise anyone?

    How uncommon it is to see a fair "ruling" regarding domain name disputes involving a company and someone who's not representing a company.

    The internet is starting to look more and more like real life, you got more money, you win.

    Come on, since when does claiming "I'm not making money off the site" mean "I want to sell the site and you're not giving me enough money"??
    If I am to believe John Gray's book, the judge has to be a female, this is too far fetched an understanding of a simple sentence. (no offense intended to the so-called "weak sex" audience)

  • If ICANN takes a domain in an act of censorship in the name of IP rights take it to a real cort and sue em.

    Hold on I already know the victoms can not afford it.. So what is needed is to stick a civil rights group on this.
    EFF or ACLU might be good places to turn.

  • I am so confused... (Score:4, Funny)

    by DaoudaW ( 533025 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @12:37PM (#2578660)
    stating that the addition of the terms "sucks" and ".com" to the Bloomberg mark does not have the effect of escaping confusing similarity

    "Microsoft sucks"
    "Why do you like MS?"
    "Huh??? I hate MS?"
    "Oh... It's all so confusingly similar."
    • Today, representatives of VivendiUniversal won a victory against the holder of www.gostickyourheadinapig.com because "Vivendi Universal" translated as "Go Stick Your Head in a Pig" in an obscure pidgin dialect used by 12 islanders living on a Melanesian atoll. Vivendi are now pursuing the islanders for inadvertently defaming their organisation, "VivendiUniversal really do care about our porcine customers, and we think their conduct is appalling and in bad taste".

      Xix.
  • Wasn't the last 'sucks' domain (I think it was wallmartsucks.com or something to the effect) awarded to the guy who registered it and not Walmart? I forget how that one ended, but I do seem to remember him also requesting that Walmart hand over walmartsucks.org and walmartsucks.net since they were obviously registered in bad faith as Walmart wasn't planning on using them.

  • What we really need (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ywwg ( 20925 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @12:41PM (#2578672) Homepage
    You know ICANN took all this time to mull over new top-level domains, why don't they add ".sucks"? They could stipulate that no one owning a copyright for a name could buy the .sucks domain, and then all of the webmasters with grudges would have their own little playground to make fun of companies. Because all of the domains end in .sucks, they could not be "confusingly similar" to the original since everyone would know what the purpose of the .sucks domain is.

    then this guy could buy vivendiuniversal.sucks, and everyone would be happy.
      • Because all of the domains end in .sucks, they could not be "confusingly similar" to the original since everyone would know what the purpose of the .sucks domain is.

      Nice try, but at the core of UCANT's rulings is the principle that Jane Surfer is a dribbling AOL-Time-Warner-Microserf who is too stupid to figure anything out and needs to be protected from her own idiocy.

      It's not just the "bad guys" who're abusing this. The Worldwide Fund for Nature, nee the World Wildlife Fund (and still known as that in the USA) has won the right to wwf.com, on the basis that the World Wresling Federation name and page is "confusingly similar" to the Worldwide Fund for Nature, and Jane Surfer might get all puzzled and donate her money to the wrong organisation. I kid you not. This is currently under appeal, and for once, I'm on the side of the Rock.

      • Re:What we really need (Score:2, Interesting)

        by belroth ( 103586 )
        As I understand it the 'World' Wrestling Federation were using the WWF acronym under license (or similar agreement) from the Worldwide Fund for Nature (the trademark holder?) in some limited circumstances. The Federation are supposed to have gone beyond the terms of the agreement and got slapped down for it, it's not a similar situation. There was an agreement and it was broken and the Wrestling Federation have thus lost the rights to use the WWF acronym.

        In other words I'm on the side of the Worldwide Fund for Nature.

        • Why would they need to license the acronym in the first place? They aren't even remotely engaged in the same sort of business. How could it even be considered a trademark infringement?

          • Precisely. The Worldwide Fund for Nature's behaviour is abusive and predatory. They retained and have protected the name World Wildlife Fund in the USA (and the trademark WWF) because of the same contemptuous contention that Jane Citizen can't deal with the acronym WWF being used by a different company.

            You're also correct that the original "licensing" of the trademark was spurious. There is no possibility of confusion between the two spheres of business, and the World Wrestling Federation acted in good faith purely to avoid bad publicity (they could have have said "Screw you" in the first place). The Worldwide Fund for Nature is now abusing the terms of that (good faith) agreement to gain control of the wwf.com domain in bad faith.

            Much as I respect the work the Worldwide Fund for Nature does, I really think that in this case they've got it badly wrong and are blowing a lot of money on lawyers to no good purpose.

      • > Nice try, but at the core of UCANT's rulings is the principle that Jane Surfer is a dribbling AOL-Time-Warner-Microserf who is too stupid to figure anything out and needs to be protected from her own idiocy.

        I was Christmas shopping this weekend when I saw a toy Harry Potter broom. It had a fairly prominent notice on the box, repeated, saying "broom does not really fly".
    • I think this solves a problem that doesn't exist. No-one can possibly confuse wiposucks.com with wipo.com. So why bother moving the dot?

      These companies are not trying to avoid confusion, they are trying to suppress free speech. Successfully, too.

    • The only problem with that is you're going against every copyright precedent in the entire world... (not being able of buy the domain if you own teh copyright). That being said, it's a great idea. I don't think anyone'll submit it though : ( too bad.
  • I'm sick of this crap. Time to start a second Internet. Free up all the domain names all over again, and this time, keep out all the corporate lawyers. Let's have some FREEDOM again! Who's with me?

    I SAID, who's with me?!

    • grumble grumble stupid tag-stripping code grumble
    • I'm sick of this crap. Time to start a second Internet. Free up all the domain names all over again, and this time, keep out all the corporate lawyers. Let's have some FREEDOM again! Who's with me?

      Er... you mean something like freeWeb [sourceforge.net], which operates on top of freeNet? [sourceforge.net]?

  • awep[ojasf (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    [whois.register.com]

    The data in Register.com's WHOIS database is provided to you by Register.com for information purposes only, that is, to assist you in obtaining information about or related to a domain name registration record. Register.com makes this information available "as is," and does not guarantee its accuracy. By submitting a WHOIS query, you agree that you will use this data only for lawful purposes and that, under no circumstances will you use this data to: (1) allow, enable, or otherwise support the transmission of mass unsolicited, commercial advertising or solicitations via direct mail, electronic mail, or by telephone; or (2) enable high volume, automated, electronic processes that apply to Register.com (or its systems). The compilation, repackaging, dissemination or other use of this data is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Register.com. Register.com reserves the right to modify these terms at any time. By submitting this query, you agree to abide by these terms.

    Organization:
    Secaucus Group Inc
    Secaucus Group Inc
    295 Greenwich Street (Suite 184)
    New York, NY 10007
    US
    Phone: (973) 503 1785
    Email: dparisi@garden.net

    Registrar Name....: Register.com
    Registrar Whois...: whois.register.com
    Registrar Homepage: http://www.register.com

    Domain Name: WIPOSUCKS.COM

    Created on..............: Mon, Apr 19, 1999
    Expires on..............: Fri, Apr 19, 2002
    Record last updated on..: Fri, Feb 23, 2001

    Administrative Contact:
    Secaucus Group Inc
    Secaucus Group Inc
    295 Greenwich Street (Suite 184)
    New York, NY 10007
    US
    Phone: (973) 503 1785
    Email: dparisi@garden.net

    Technical Contact:
    Dan Parisi
    Dan Parisi
    295 Greenwich Street (Suite 184)
    New York, NY 10007
    US
    Phone: (973) 503 1785
    Email: dparisi@garden.net

    Zone Contact:
    Dan Parisi
    Dan Parisi
    295 Greenwich Street (Suite 184)
    New York, NY 10007
    US
    Phone: (973) 503 1785
    Email: dparisi@garden.net

  • The ICANN dispute resolution system has no legal value, it is just a dispute resolution solution. If the output don't match your hopes, you can still take the thing to court (a real one).

  • The Bastards! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @12:44PM (#2578684) Homepage Journal
    I'm going to vote them all out in the next election! Oh... Wait...
  • Such intellectually bankrupt decisions are even more problematic than they first appear because poor decisions serve as precedents that enable more and poorer rulings. The result is a UDRP system that has sent fairness into a death-spiral.

    Quite frankly, some of these "panelists" need to go back to grade school.

    Whatever happened to "First come first served?".

    No, really, I'm dead serious, if a corporation thinks that they can wait years, quite literally, and claim their domanin name...fuck 'em.

    McD's, and Coke, I believe did this..and lest we forget etoy and etoys. I've used etoys many times before they went away, never even visited etoy... no confusion there.

    If nothing else, forget the "sucks" how about appending "sucksthebigone"...never be a typo as far as I can tell.

    Anyone got a sack full of clue sticks? My arms are getting tired.
  • My favorite quote from the dissenting panel member statement:


    As the majority suggests, there may well be some narrow categories of trademarks for which the word "sucks" does not clearly disassociate a domain name from the trademark, and therefore it may be unwise to adopt a per se rule holding that "sucks" domain names can never be found confusingly similar to the trademarks they contain. But the Complainant in this proceeding does not claim to be known as a manufacturer of vacuum cleaners or suction pumps, or as a self-deprecating alternative rock band, or a test laboratory for beverage straws, or a porn star, a black hole, or any other sort of entity that people are likely to associate with sucking.

  • Media Monopoly (Score:4, Interesting)

    by spamkabuki ( 458468 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @12:55PM (#2578715) Homepage
    I know this will piss some (many) people off, but I often find these domain name spats touchingly irrelevant.

    In the long term, will domain name shortage be a real and continuing problem?

    Just putting ...sucks... on a domain doesn't offer much in the way of real criticism. Effective activism isn't as easy as calling people names. If it's just a prank, then isn't all the hoopla a bit overblown?

    Corporate dominance of public discourse is not a new problem. All the free access to domain names in the world will not overcome the fact that most of what most people see/read/hear is controlled by a relatively small group of greedy people. The world is poorer for it, but this is old news.

    Try reading some pulped tree products for a great discussion of these problems. I'd start with Ben Bagdikian's classic, The Media Monopoly-- http://www.commoncouragepress.com/bagdikian_monopo ly.html
    You'll find some more pressing media control issues than "...sucks.com".

    • Re:Media Monopoly (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Trepalium ( 109107 )
      I think all this has more to do with the absolute lack of consistency in WIPO rulings. First the rule that adding sucks to a domain name is a recognised method for protesting a company, and deny the request to have the domain turned over. Later on, when Vivendi Universal gets hit with a sucks.com domain, WIPO rules that [companyname]sucks.com is "confusingly similar", and goes to great lengths do legitimize handing over the domain to them.

      I often have to wonder if either ICANN or WIPO have heard of the term "integrity". Can anyone remember when ICANN's mandate was to be democratically elected? Seems like such a long time ago.

    • Just putting ...sucks... on a domain doesn't offer much in the way of real criticism.

      Um.. I don't think that the domain name was the sum total of the criticism. I'd hazard a guess that there was some more in-depth criticism on the actual web page.
      • I don't think that the domain name was the sum total of the criticism. I'd hazard a guess that there was some more in-depth criticism on the actual web page.

        Apparently there was NOTHING on the web page until Vivendi filed the complaint. The guy was going to "get around to" putting a page up, but hadn't for whatever period of months.

        After the complaint was filed, he rushed right out and got a page up on that site. Before then, he was sitting on it.

        Not that I agree with the WIPO decision here, but lets be sure we have all of the facts.
      • Just putting ...sucks... on a domain doesn't offer much in the way of real criticism. Effective activism isn't as easy as calling people names

      How condescending of you to bestow your opinion on us. Would you also argue that any company that makes poor or light use of a domain shouldn't be allowed to have it? You might want to ponder that foosucks.bar is the de-facto protest address of choice for groups with real grievances, and it's as well to protect that on freedom of speech grounds if no other.

    • Corporate dominance of public discourse is not a new problem.

      That's right, terrorism is the new problem, and all this talk of corporate dominance is just distracting us from the real challenge: terrorismsucks.com!
  • www.prolonged-discussion-about-whether-adding-suck s-to-the-end-of-a-second-level-domain-name-makes-i t-confusingly-similar-or-not-when-anyone-with-a-ce ll-of-gray-matter-can-tell-the-difference-sucks.co m
  • VivendiUniversalSucksALot.com
    VivendiUniversalPue.com
    VivendiUniversalPueGrave.com
    VivendiUniversalSucksRocksThroughAThinCurlyStraw .c om
    VivendiUniveraslCanSuckMyBollocks.com
    VivendiUniversal-sucks.com
    VivendiSuckniversal.com
    FuckVivendiUniversal.com
  • http://www.udrpinfo.com/

    Use the top right hand drop box.

    Alan L. Limbury, Presiding Panelist
    Sir Ian Barker, Panelist
    David E. Sorkin, Panelist, (Dissenting in this case)
    Note that Sorkin doesn't get to arbitrate many cases on his own.

    Things that make you go hmmmm.

  • Let that be a lesson to the owners of xxxsucks.com sites. You should provide translations of "sucks" in Chinese, Spanish, etc.!

  • The similarity part is how the laws are worded (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I'm a business owner and when I formed my business I issued an article of organization to my state that includes an article of name reservation. As part of that I'm not allowed to start a company with a name similar enough to confuse or damage another business. It's pretty simple really, if I call my business Yoyodyne Corp. somebody cannot create Xoyodyne or a Yoyodyne or 1 Yoyodyne or Yoyodyne balls or anything designed to hurt my business. (like show up in phone book deceptively before my business or sound insulting to my business) It's open and shut just about every time.

    This is simple. The owner of the domain was clearly within that definition of deceptively similar. I don't even see why this is being discussed, some guy disliked a business, he didn't say that one his web page, he in essence organized a public entity which defaces them by its existence and he lost when they defended their image. If somebody puts up slashdotsucks.org and slashdot of va chooses to fight it, they'd win too.

  • Please note the following before flaming and modding:

    ...the Panel has found that non-English speaking Internet users would be likely to attach no significance to the appended word 'sucks' and would therefore regard the disputed domain name as conveying an association with the Complainant.

    This makes sense. That's really all there is to it. Non English speaking people truly could be confused by this. (Maybe it's a new movie called 'sucks' being released by VivendiUniversal ?)

    Translating languages is difficult enough, but translanting slang and vernacular is almost impossible. Just try listening to some 12 year old girls describe Britteny Spears (sp?). Or try to remember (if you're old enough) 80's style valley girl speak... it's incomprehensible to fluent English speakers, I don't even want to imagine how non English speakers interpret this. For example, if I bought 'totallygrodyvivendiuniversal.com', how many English speakers would know what the hell it meant, and from the name whether it was a legitimate VU website or not? I doubt any non-English speakers would.

    And furthermore, if you are concerned about free speech violations, register "IDoNotLikeVivendiUniversal.com". If that gets taken away, we have a problem.

    • ...non-english speaking people would be going to the VivendiUniversal.com site in the first place. Since the whole site is English, I highly doubt that.

      • Great Britain: pissed = inebriated.
        United States: pissed = angry.

        Great Britain: football
        United States: soccer

        So a domain name that were to use the word "pissed" could certainly cause confusion even within the English-speaking world.

        Same thing goes with "sucks". Now of course Great Britain might fall in line on that particular word, but what about the rest of the English-speaking world?

    • Change English (Score:2, Funny)

      by WoOS ( 28173 )

      the Panel has found that non-English speaking Internet users would be likely to attach no significance to the appended word 'sucks' and would therefore regard the disputed domain name as conveying an association with the Complainant.

      Hmm, the VivendiUniversialSucks.com site starts with:
      Why Does Vivendi/Universal Suck?
      Vivendi is a large, behemoth corporation that exists merely .....

      It's in English. So non-English speakers could actually have some problems reading the site and it is therefore irrelevant if they know what 'sucks' mean. The site also does not feature any VU logos but rants about conglomerates like Vivendi. Surely any reader will immediatly think that it is an official VU site.

      I guess that WIPO would like to have an Orwellian version of English with domain names like "VivendiUniversialDoublePlusUngood.com"

    • Phooey. (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Let's say someone is looking for information on a Spanish company called "la comida de vida" (the food of life). Their first choices will be "lacomidadevida.com", "lacomidadevida.net", or maybe even "lacomidadevida.es", if this person is particularly savvy with his country codes. If he does not know Spanish and some guy who DOES speak Spanish happens to have taken "lacomidadevidacomiomipene", the guy will not run into this parody website called "the food of life ate my penis".Why?

      Because you have to already know the domain name you are looking for to access the website! If someone else has registered a parody domain name, a person who does not speak Spanish will probably not run into it in the first place.

    • Uh, what significance will non-English speaking people attach to "IDoNotLike" that they cannot add to "Sucks"?

      Speech is speech is speech.

      • You missed the point of my post. "sucks" is slang - not always translated properly. "I do not like" is proper English, and more easily translated and understood.
        • You missed the point of my post.

          Doubtful, but I'm confident you missed the point of mine. If a non-English speaking person has to translate the domain name to find it what it is, he would have to translate "IDoNotLike" just as he would have to translate "sucks". The point is moot.

          Further, I don't know why I would care that Björn Björk in the fjörds of Öslö Nörway doesn't know what "sucks" means if I owned a "sucks" domain. Chances are what I have there wasn't necessarily written for him anyway. I would have used English vernacular because I speak English. In essence, you're applauding WIPO for regulating the use of slang in a domain registrant's native language. Yay.

    • Look we're all on the same internet, and most of us that visit .com and not just .ru,.is, etc speak English at some level. And having grown up in another country I can tell you we learned American curse words long before we learned English in school.

      I always try visiting the ...sucks.com if I'm about to buy a big ticket item from someone, or if I've already been screewed. Often it goes to that sucky sucks500 site, but it still works enough of the time to be useful.

      BTW Is there anything but tradition keeping us attached to the ICANN? Couldn't any group set up alternative root servers and ask everyone to point to them? If the group had consistent rules and an effective feedback process we might all join it and leave the icann to serve the .mil & .gov ghetto. Yeah, Yeah, fracture the internet.. just cc the old database, set up rules dissallowing anyone from owning a sucks.com for a company they do not actively critizise, review all icann domain decisions awarding the domain to the deserving party instead of the monied party. Have the complaintant pay the defendants legal bills up to some multiple of the complaintants cost, say 1.5x if they lose, 0.5x if the compaintant wins.

      You could donate fairnamessucks.com to icann ;)
      • set up rules dissallowing anyone from owning a sucks.com for a company they do not actively critizise,

        I think this guy would have lost his case then, if this was THE RULE.

        Apparently he didn't have anything up on that web site until after Vivendi filed the complaint. Hadn't "gotten around to it".

        He rushed right out and got some content up immediately after the complaint was filed.

  • Customer Confusion (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Happy Monkey ( 183927 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @01:45PM (#2578857) Homepage
    To avoid customer confusion, the owner of a domain name should be required to put up a page at that domain that is appropriate to the domain name. Someone putting up a pro-Vivendi site at a "Sucks" domain is obviously attempting to trick customers into thinking that Vivendi does not suck.

  • On Primus and Sucking... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by VValdo ( 10446 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @01:46PM (#2578859)
    The WIPO panel goes so far as to insist that because the band Primus owns the domain name primussucks.com (named after their 1990 album "Suck on This"), prospective visitors to vivendi.com might get confused about who's who.

    Well, kinda. Back in the late 80s/early 90s, Primus fans used the term "sucks" in an ironic fashion. It was kind of an inside joke -- ie, Primus fans would have bumper stickers that said "PRIMUS SUCKS", t-shirts etc. It was a heavily sarcastic way [fortunecity.com] of showing your fanness, typical of the early 90's rejection of corporate culture (grunge, etc.-- Ah, take a moment to remember the glory days before all TV and advertising was wry and tongue-in-cheek and corporate marketers didn't know how to handle "Generation X".)

    Seeing as it was originally a joke slogan meant to confuse non-"true" Primus fans, it makes no sense to use it as an example of how the general public might get confused-- that was the whole point!

    W

  • Did ANYONE read the decision? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Rev.LoveJoy ( 136856 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @01:55PM (#2578878) Homepage Journal
    Did anyone read the WIPO decision? The whole thing? Down to the part that says ...

    It is common ground that no use was made of the disputed domain name between the date of registration, February 27, 2001, and the date when notice of the dispute was given to the Respondents by way of "cease and desist" letter on July 26, 2001.

    That's right, it was dead space. The whole redirect to geektivism is ex post fact, folks. Capitolizing on /. eyeballs, if you will.

    While I think the WIPO decision is a laughable miscarriage of Justice*, I do find it a bit difficult to feel really high and mighty and start saying, "oh, how terribly awful." Even the fellow who registered the thing seems to have a good sense of humor about this whole joke.

    Personally, I would wager that he's feeling the same way I am about the whole charade. Vivendi's response and the fact they actually convinced WIPO to give them the domain name is really just prooving this guy's point.

    Cheers,
    - RLJ

    * Justice? These guys are lawyers, come on now...

  • As already mentioned, the Respondents did have prior knowledge of the VIVENDI UNIVERSAL mark and they deliberately chose to register a domain name which incorporated that mark in its entirety. In so doing, they might have thought that the word "sucks" would serve to distinguish the disputed domain name from the mark. However, in this regard they were mistaken, at least so far as non-English speakers are concerned, and they must bear the consequences of the risk they took.
    That's a great argument(!) - So if I was to register www.this-site-has-nothing-to-do-with-vivendi-unive rsal.com it could still be judged as confusing because non-English speakers may not understand?

    Laughable.
  • Let's think about things for a second. If I opened up a fast food restaurant called "McDonald's Sucks" should I be forced to change my name? Yes.

    If I decided to call my bookstore "Barnes and Noble Bites" should I be forced to pick a new name? Yes.

    If I decided to starta phone company called "AT&T Blows" should I be forced to use something else? Yes.

    Then why shouldn't the same standard be applied to websites? Why shouldn't trademarks be protected? I'm not a fan of being hampered in life by the law, being oppressed by monopolistic behavior, or having commercialism shoved down my throat. However, I believe in the right to have my own name and not have someone slander said name.

    • Because what you suggest isn't protecting trademarks. No, you can't start a store called "McDonald's Sucks". Yes, you can put up a sign saying "McDonald's Sucks" and tell people why you think they suck. You can't spread falsehoods, but if you stick to the truth McDonald's can't legally touch you.

      This is the fallacy that the UDRP falls into: the assumption that only trademark gives a valid claim to a name. It's what leads to decisions that a person doesn't have the right to use their own name for a Web site about themselves.

      • You can't spread falsehoods, but if you stick to the truth McDonald's can't legally touch you.

        If only this were true. You may have already read it, but for anybody who hasn't had the chance to read McLibel [mcspotlight.org] it's a fascinating investigation into the inadequacies of the British legal system in defamation cases.

        Basically two very poor people got sued by McDonalds. These two people said things like "McDonalds food it not nutritous" and "McDonalds beef is grown on land that was previously rainforests". Nothing to dispute there, right?

        McDonalds argued that anything with nutrients is nutritous: this definition covered paper, soil, and so on. They also argued that because the forests hadn't received rainfall 365 days a year they were not rainforests.

        The judge agreed with this nonsense, ignored the experts brought in by the defendants, and somehow allowed his common sense to slip far enough to rule against the two very poor people.

        Telling the truth is not a legal defence. If you have enough money - as McDonalds did - then you get to write your own laws.

        • "Telling the truth is not a legal defence. If you have enough money - as McDonalds did - then you get to write your own laws."

          Unfortunately you are right. This day and age a common person has no options other then violence. If the courts are corrupted, the politicians are corrupted, the media is corrupted what else is there to do except take arms (or chemicals or bacteria).

        • Actually there'd be plenty to dispute, as McDonald's proved. That's why you have to stick to the truth and the facts, not your interpretation. Instead of saying "McDonald's grows food on land that used to be rainforests.", you say "McDonald's grows food on land that <list of agencies classify as rainforest.". The former's subject to interpretation as to exactly what constitutes a rainforest, while the latter's a strictly factual statement that leaves McDonald's very little target for claiming what you said is not true.

          • Which is why the party with the money wins. They can spend more payola on lawyers to dissect the meaning of the word "truth" until it is illegal for me to post this commnet as I have no inherent right to the words of the English language, and require permission from the Corporation for Thoughts, Ideas and Free Thinking after they patented the enhanced genome sequence for fetal brain development that is mandatory in all registered newborns.

            Seriously, lawyers are the high priests of our new Dark Ages. We no longer battle w/ sword, but by the pen, and semantics. And it is all about the interpretation of words.
    • So are you suggesting that the guy who registered vivendiuniversalsucks.com was planning to start a multi-national media conglomerate?
      • So are you suggesting that the guy who registered vivendiuniversalsucks.com was planning to start a multi-national media conglomerate?

        No, the person to whome you replied is merely shilling for WIPO and/or Vivendi Universal (who does suck, greatly). Perhaps they have even been paid to, as well known Microsoft astroturfers here and on K5 have been observed doing, or perhaps this person (or a close friend) have a vested interest in either this case in particular or the corrupt process in general.

        Or perhaps that person really is as stupid as they appear, as your sarcastic response amply demonstrates their argument to be.
    • Try calling 1-800-FUCK-ATT or 1-800-FUCK-MCI. They're collect call services that (obviously) don't use AT&T or MCI. I don't know if they're still around....but still...
    • If I decided to call my bookstore "Barnes and Noble Bites" should I be forced to pick a new name? Yes.

      If I title a magazine article "weez75 Sucks" you'd come after me? I'm not selling what you're selling in competition with you, I'm just reviewing your business and character. If we get to a world where it infringes your property to mention your name in a noncomplimentary context, then, weez75, because you will have helped in your insignificant way to get us there, what I'll do if I catch up with you will also be unspeakable.

    • Whoa there. You're confusing slander and trademark law. And neither would apply to this case in a proper court of law, at least in the USA.

  • ICANN -- Just say "No, thanks" (Score:5, Informative)

    by Dr. Zowie ( 109983 ) <slashdot.deforest@org> on Saturday November 17, 2001 @02:33PM (#2578977)
    So stop whining already and point your name client at OpenNIC [unrated.net], the non-ICANN name space. (Of course, OpenNIC includes the ICANN name space as a subdomain).

  • .sucks (Score:1, Redundant)

    by germinatoras ( 465782 )
    It's too bad they don't just make a new TLD ".sucks". Then all the anti-[whatever] sites could be filed in there.

  • That ruling was worth reading... (Score:5, Informative)

    by softsign ( 120322 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @02:53PM (#2579028)
    ... just to find this from dissenting panelist David Sorkin:
    "As the majority suggests, there may well be some narrow categories of trademarks for which the word "sucks" does not clearly disassociate a domain name from the trademark, and therefore it may be unwise to adopt a per se rule holding that "sucks" domain names can never be found confusingly similar to the trademarks they contain. But the Complainant in this proceeding does not claim to be known as a manufacturer of vacuum cleaners or suction pumps, or as a self-deprecating alternative rock band, or a test laboratory for beverage straws, or a porn star, a black hole, or any other sort of entity that people are likely to associate with sucking. And even if the Complainant did fall within one of these categories, it would still bear the burden of proving a likelihood of confusion."

    Bravo!

  • Things like that only makes you wonders whether this world is just. I guess we are see it for ourselves

  • For those who lost their "sucks" domain (Score:4, Funny)

    by kindbud ( 90044 ) on Saturday November 17, 2001 @03:03PM (#2579066) Homepage
    I'll offer a delegation from my 2nd level domain, so for example, the domain that was taken from "j d sallen" can be replaced with the one I am offering: vivendiuniversalsucks.thekindbud.com.

    Someone who is more enterprising than myself could set up some more 3rd level delegations, like vivendiuniversalsucks.mydick.com, vivendiuniversalsucks.greencanalwater.com, vivendiuniversalsucks.theyjustsuckperiod.com, and so on...

    WIPO and ICANN have no authority over 3rd level delegations, as far as I know. But that might be an interesting battle if they were to try to take away a domain that was used in this way.
  • This is why there should be more top level domains available. If "McDonald's Sporting Goods" registered mcdonalds.com first, it would probably result in McDonalds the waste-management..err..fast food chain strongarming them into surrendering the name. So, we could have

    mcdonalds.food
    mcdonalds.sports
    mcdonalds.criticism or mcdonalds.sucks

    No confusion there...type in mcdonalds.food looking for sporting goods, and I'll promptly beat you about the head and chest with a hammer. Of course, someone typing companySUCKS.com looking for that company is equally amazing, even in hypothetical considerations. But, this would mean companies can't complain, or at least make a nice-sounding case for themselves.

    As for this Vivendi case, its just absurd. Unless the owners of that site were claiming to be affiliated with Vivendi Universal, or made an identical site to hawk a similar product, it boils down to whether or not we are allowed to badmouth a corporation...or worse yet, say their name without praise and a genuflect.

    And upon review of the facts, the courts found that Vivendi Universal really does suck, and no damages should be awarded.
  • More importantly, it must be borne in mind that not all Internet users speak English as their mother tongue.

    Maybe so, but how many people on the internet have never seen an american movie? It's pretty dificult to be un-aware of certain american slang terms these days.
  • vivendisucksuniversal.com
    Or, for the more creative types:
    vivendisucksuniversally.com

    Would non-English speakers be confused and think this is a Vivendi Universal site? And if some would be confused, would it just be really stupid non-English speakers who automatically assume that any domain containing the strings "vivendi" and "universal" must be official Vivendi Universal sites? At what point does individual stupidity become the responsibility of the individual and not the domain owner?
  • is you have to register *whatever name* and add a *whatever name + sucks*?

    Ok, I'll bite, is this included when you register a name?

    "Hello, I'd like to register 'mycompanyname'"

    "Ok, that is available, would you like to sucks your name as well"

    "????"

    Heh, and much merriment was had by all.

    But on a serious note, the dude has a point:
    If that weren't enough, Vivendi has even threatened the owner of VivendiUniversalSucks.com, which points to this page. Although they have no legal grounds for such a threat, they believe they can unethically bully ordinary citizens into giving up legitimate first amendment speech against them.

    Yeah, I'm going to summone my powers for stating the obvious, because it it often over looked, the obvious, that is and say:
    "This suprises no one".

    And why, I ask, does it seem these four letter acronyms are the main perps in bullying private citizens? WIPO, MPAA, RIAA et al?

    I dunno, but it seems to me that at least one citizen is not going to be a corporation's WIPO'ing boy (whipping boy).

    Oh, and not to make lite of this person's plight but he hinted at the phrase "corporate ethics" which as most of us are aware is an oxymoron.
  • If the non-English speaking visitors are confused by the work "suck", then they are really going to be confused when they realize the web site's content is in English too!
  • One of the key points of the ruling was the judgment that non-English speakers might confuse the domain name with Vivendi trademark. The fear is that someone would stumble onto the website and think that it's Vivendi, when it's actually not. However, it seems to me that a nonanglophone would find the page utterly unintelligible, assuming the thing was written entirely in English. It would be equivalent to a nonfrancophone stumbling onto a page with a domain name of whatever "vivendisucks" is in French. The nonfrancophone might not make the distinction, but if the page were written entirely in French, it would also be quite meaningless to that person. Thus, the supposedly infringing domain should not cause the slightest harm to the trademark holder, unless if the person viewing the page somehow thought the graphics layout of the page to be unworthy of an international corporation. All of which is to say, the primary premise of the ruling seems utterly ridiculous.
  • This is an example of why centrallized controling organizations cannot be trusted. They will always exhibit a tendency to decide in favor of the current centrallized power organization.

    When designing systems, please always bear in mind that centralized points of control need to be avoided.

    Even within a business organization this is usually true. Information will only flow to those who need it (perhaps to make the proper decisions) if it is able to do so without repercussions to those who transmit it. (OTOH, legal precedents make it clear that any such information should have a short expiration date. And that it should be automatically deleted after that date.)

    Please remember, the feeling of pain that one experiences when one touches a hot stove may save one from a more lasting injury. And you aren't supposed to like it.

    .
  • As a matter of civic.. er... communal pride, this cannot be tolerated.

    To quote ICANN's own website:
    Decisions under the Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy are subject to challenge by court action. The long list of their outrageous abuses of power can, still, be found here [icann.org] although the text of this particular decision isn't on that page yet, it's back, as I'm sure someone else has posted and I just missed it here [geektivism.com].

    So, we collect some money and make some phone calls to the ACLU and bring ICANN to court. This is a surrealistic violation of ICANN's own charter, not to mention of our sensibilities, and even if we lose (which we probably will) we should take it to court to generate bad press for them.
    • IANAL... blah blah

      This is a good idea. Courts have upheld the "unauthorized" use of trademarks for parody and criticizm. However, each former domain holder would need to sue ICANN, unless a court granted class-action status to such a case. Either way, you're looking at mucho denerio required for such a case.
  • According to Dotster [dotster.com], http://www.vivsucks.com is still available. If I wasn't so poor, I'd register it myself. Would someone be kind enough to purchase it and donate it to the guy who just got the shaft from WIPO?

    It is kind of funny to think that www.vivendiSucks.com will probably redirect to www.vivendi.com... Kind of like if www.MicrosoftAKAUltimateEvil.com redirected to www.microsoft.com...
  • My bullshit meter goes off the scale when the same group that allows p0rn cybersquatters to 'steal' domains from churches and small non-profit groups decides to squash some poor person who registers a *sucks.com domain. Even my non-technical friends Clearly understand what those domain names imply.

    What should have been done, was to sell the vivendiuniversalsucks.com domain to a p0rn site and let them battle it out... now THAT would be fun to watch ;)
  • since there is no primusreallysucks.com precedent, this domain should be allowed by a 3rd party.

    ... or perhaps, since even non english speakers know what fuck means, vivendifuckspigs.com is also not taken, and would satisfy the WIPO's requirements for a protest site.
  • FYI you can still buy WIPO.Sucks.net for $30 at Register.com [register.com] not to mention VivendiStillSucks.com
  • I own the Geektivism.com website that VIVENDIUNIVERSALSUCKS.COM points to. Oddly, this site is dedicated to increasing activism in technology-related issues where the little man is getting squashed.

    What's incredibly disturbing about this opinion is that there was a perfectly legitimate, NON-COMMERCIAL gripe site up at VIVENDIUNIVERSALSUCKS.COM, which aired the opinions of both myself and David Sallen, the owner of the domain. Rather than recognizing this, and David Sallen's and my free speach rights, the UDRP panel took it upon itself to decide that our critical free speech just wasn't good enough in it's opinion. This is absolute garbage, plain and simple.

    In any event, if anyone wants to take a look at David's response to the complaint in this matter, I've posted it at Geektivism [geektivism.com]. Feel free to drop by and leave comments about this case. I will be updating my site regularly to reflect ongoing news in this atrocity of a UDRP decision.

    MD

  • Dan Parisi owns a ton of "sucks" websites with no content on them. His name turns up time and again in these UDRP stories because of that.

    Is he a squatter? Of course he is. But he's not registering these domains in bad faith to shake down the entities which purportedly "suck", he's doing it to shake down the pissed-off people who get burned by Corporation X and want to put up a "sucks" site.
  • Registering a domain name costs $10-$20. Add the cost of some low end hosting for a year and you're looking at $50-$100.

    Filing a complaint with ICANN costs $1000 or more. Add to this the cost of lawyers required to draw up the complaint and a company like Vivendi Universal is probably looking at $5000 to take the domain name.

    Why not simply register a new name and wait for Vivendi Universal to get around to taking that one as well. Then repeat the process until you get bored or Vivendi runs out of money. Remember it costs a company about 100 times more to take a domain from someone as it does to initially register it. Under a system like this a few geeks could easily wage a guerrilla war against any opponent and either make them stop taking domain names, or drive them into bankruptcy.

    So if Vivendi Universal now owns vivendiuniversalsucks.com here are a very short list of a few similar domains might still be available. With a little imagination I'm sure there are hundreds if not thousands of possible domains that embody the basic idea that "Vivendi Universal Sucks".

    vivendiuniversalreallysucks.com
    vivendiuniversalreallyreallysucks.com
    vivendiuniversalsucksbad.com
    vivendiuniversalreallysucksbad.com
    vivendi-universal-really-sucks-bad.com
    vivendi-universal-really-really-sucks-bad.com
    vivendiuniversal-reallyreally-sucksbad.com
    etc...
  • Most trademarks share its name or initials with many others. When authorities could put trademark identity beyond shadow of doubt, they are either devoid of intelligence or corrupt.

    The United Nations World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO.org) and the United States Department of Commerce (DOC.gov) are hiding the simple solution to trademark and domain name problem.

    The US Patent and Trademark Office virtually admitted this, on August 22, 2000: "The questions you raised with respect to trademark conflicts, as well as the proposed solutions, have their basis in good common-sense. As such, they have been debated and discussed quite exhaustively within the USPTO, the Administration, and internationally."

    Yet the authorities refuse to admit the ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENTS. To deny this, is to be without honour.

    The solution was ratified by honest attorneys - including the honourable G. Gervaise Davis III, UN WIPO panelist judge.

    Please visit WIPO.org.uk [wipo.org.uk] to see the answer.

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