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The Neverending Sex.com Story 249

Posted by michael from the wheels-of-justice dept.
fwc writes "This has to be the story which will never end. Back in 1996, Steven Cohen "stole" sex.com from its original owner (Gary Kremen) by forging a letter to Network Solutions asking for the domain to be transferred to him. Subsequently Kremen sued to get the domain name returned. Through what seemed to be a neverending parade of lawsuits and judgements (Documented on slashdot here, here, here and here, and also in several other places), Kremen finally got his domain back and Cohen was ordered to pay $65 million in damages. In the latest twist, Cohen is asking the US Supreme Court to overturn the verdict of the lower courts by claiming that he owned the sex.com trademark prior to Kremen registering the domain. This should prove interesting since it looks like the filing at the USPTO occured two years after the domain was originally registered."
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The Neverending Sex.com Story More

The Neverending Sex.com Story

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  • Why want? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Malicious ( 567158 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:04AM (#5917866)
    Who would want that domain?
    You won't be able to send spam (I don't accept any email that contains the word sex, espescially in the address)
    You'll be blocked by every single netnanny on the planet.
    Your only visitors will be minors, who don't know how to search for porn, besides typing "sex" into the address bar.
    Doesn't sound like the best audience to me.

  • Who cares? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by geschild ( 43455 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:04AM (#5917871) Homepage

    Given the amount of comments thusfar, nobody?

  • Prior art (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:05AM (#5917875)
    I could try to make some joke about there having to be some prior art concerning sex, but I think this subject has been "beaten" to death... as it were.

  • What a waste of court time! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rkz ( 667993 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:05AM (#5917877) Homepage Journal
    All this suing countersuing and appealing just makes lawers richers and everyone else more pissed off! Network solutions should have been able to handle this on their own and stopped this whole mess.

  • Of course regardless of if his claim is valid (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Mossfoot ( 310128 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:06AM (#5917889) Homepage
    he still FORGED a signature in order to get the domain back. Right or wrong that's still breaking the law, isn't it?

    • yes (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Ender Ryan ( 79406 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:41AM (#5918111) Journal
      Why yes, yes it is still breaking the law. Besides the fact that he applied for the trademark 2 years after the original registration of the domain, forging a signature is a serious offense. I say throw the bastard in the slammer for a few months.

      I wish /. had a full-time lawyer to read over this stuff and offer her opinion, that would be cool.

      • Actually, only ONE year. Well, more like seven months.

        According to Whois.sc [whois.sc], the domain name was registered in October 18, 1995. The Sex.Com trademark, however, was registered [uspto.gov] on May 20, 1996.

        Slight difference there.
        • He also claims to have used the name since June of 1979 for "providing access to an electronic bulletin board in the field of adult entertainment."

  • This IS the never ending story (Score:3, Insightful)

    by the-dude-man ( 629634 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:09AM (#5917909)
    My god...this just never ends, he stole the domain...i dont know what ever possesed him to think he would get away with it...he got canned (big suprised) and hit with a lawsuit (wich he deserved) I hope the judge rules that he has to pay....and they both have to shut up about the whole thing. This has been going on far to long now

  • This never would have happened (Score:5, Informative)

    by dirkdidit ( 550955 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:09AM (#5917910) Homepage
    From day one Network Solutions has been horrible. Their customer service sucks. Because of their f-ck ups in the early days it is now nearly impossible to get information changed on an older domain. Compared to other companies, their prices are shit. And because of all this they ended up causing lawsuits. I'm just happy that now(or for the past few years) there is more than one choice for registering a domain name.

    • Compared to, say, 1998... (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      ...Network Solutions is wonderful now. I'll agree with you on the pricing issue, they charge what's basically a ridiculous amount given the number of other registrars out there who are happy to register for $10/year and provide good service. I would never recommend them to anyone now.

      However, compared to several years ago, Network Solutions' security policies are very good at this point. Perhaps too good - I've heard horror stories about people having to go get documents notarized and snailmail them in jus
      • Well, at the time I registered my domain back in 98 or 99, NSI had the default authentication set to a simple email reply.

        There were, as I recall, two more options which required that user tag/passwords be included in any change of domain email request.

        I selected one of those options - there's no way my site would've ever got stolen... That's all it takes.

        Of course, the default security selection (as usual) was the most lax, to avoid scaring off customers.

        N.
    • I will say that Network Solutions surpised me once in that I rang up as needed some DNS servers changed (old domain so web interface didn't work). I though that it would take ages to get sorted. Loads of faxing etc. However rang up, got through to CS, said what I wanted to do and had it done 10 minutes. However I guess that I just got lucky that day

      Rus
  • ... seen the commercials?

    All this sex.com "controversy" makes me wanna take a few extra-strength Motrins... /me mutters something and gets back to making amanda load stuff into the proper slot and receiving dumps from clients

    [ you know... amanda [amanda.org] :) ]

  • Talk about taking site squatting to the max (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mharris007 ( 142886 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:10AM (#5917924) Homepage
    Talk about taking site squatting to the max.

    I'm going to tell my children stories of Steven Cohen and his values of perseverence.

    I also wonder if someone (other than the courts) can evaluate the sex.com websites value ($65 million is what the courts ruled, don't know if that includes any other charges with it). But I can only imagine the money sex.com could bring in.
  • This just proves that sex is worth big money.
    • Actually, this just proves that honesty and doing things by the books is not the American way, and the good guy never wins.
  • ...the first thing to do is to create http://goatse.sex.com ! Then, he'll be RICH!!

  • End this petty dispute. I want to start using it.

    In the meantime, cocks.com [cocks.com] is a good substitute.

  • dot com bubble burst? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Hadlock ( 143607 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:17AM (#5917968) Homepage Journal
    i thought the dot com bubble already burst? didn't we figure out that a specific generic name does not = lots of visitors? are these guys arguing over who owns it for their ego's sake? what a waste of time.

  • Any relation? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by whoop ( 194 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:18AM (#5917975) Homepage
    Any relation to the Steve Cohen that is suing George Bush, Tommy Franks, etc for war crimes in Iraq? Or just someone else who is similarly sue-happy?

  • How silly is his patent? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by WIAKywbfatw ( 307557 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:22AM (#5918005) Journal
    I don't know if his trademark application was successful (and, frankly, in this particular case, I almost don't care) but it's pretty damning of the USPTO if it did award a trademark for to someone for a domain name that belonged to a third party.

    Maybe the paperwork that was filed with the application was fraudulent - it wouldn't surprise me, given the rest of the sordid history surrounding this domain name custody case - but I would hope that the USPTO would check just who owned a domain name before recognising someone's right to own a trademark based upon that name.

    Because, if domain name ownership isn't a legal or moral requirement when applying for the relevant trademark, this will open the floodgates to a slew of tenuous and unfounded applications. Anyone could file for a trademark for business.com, shop.com, maps.com, tickets.com, or any other generic (non-company specific) domain name in the hope of fleecing the legitimate domain name owners in a civil courtroom.

    Every way you look at it, this trademark application stinks. It should never be granted. Hopefully, the USPTO will see sense and learn something from this sad story.

    • Re:How silly is his patent? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by los furtive ( 232491 ) <ChrisLamothe@@@gmail...com> on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:38AM (#5918093) Homepage

      ...it's pretty damning of the USPTO if it did award a trademark for to someone for a domain name that belonged to a third party.

      Although he obtained the domain name by illegitimate means, at the time it didn't belong to a third party as far as the books were concerned, so how was the USPTO to know?

    • Actually, all he had to do was show that he had used the mark in commerce or had a bona fide intent to use the mark in commerce to file the app. In the latter case, he could have filed up to three year's worth of extensions for time to show use of the mark in commerce.

      The USPTO is not the "trademark police". It is the trademark holder's responsibility to police the mark. So when he filed his app, other potentially valid owners should file notices of opposition (to the registration of the mark). While filing for a "domain name" may seem like the more important thing to do... afterall, you have the domain, you own it, right?... a trademark owner can trump your domain name registration with prior use of the mark.

      Now, they may have a battle in trying to get the domain name transferred (obviosuly, this case is a battle). The USPTO doesn't "compare notes" with NetSol. In fact, I doubt they all that much give a hoot about NetSol.

      The key point is that, even though the guy who forged the letter may have had "bad faith" in acquiring the domain name, if he actually used the trademark first AND filed for the USPTO application first, he is the "senior user" and would theoretically win the "trademark battle".

      Domain names are pretty irrelevant to trademark rights. The fact that you reserve one doesn't mean jack to the USPTO nor the courts in determining who owns a trademark (especially if all you do is reserve it and park it!). If anything, you are better off spending that money filing with the USPTO, because the key thing an USPTO application gets you is "constructive notice" (i.e., anybody who uses your mark after you should have known you owned it) and that is more powerful than registering a domain name (which, by itself, is not use in commerce anyway).

    • What's really interesting about that trademark application is that it is under opposition. (See here [uspto.gov].)

      You'll note that not only did Cohen's trademark lawyers "fire" him, but that this application is about to die.

      And as a note to an above post, the USPTO actually does kind of act like the "trademark police" in the opposition process. Think of it like an administrative court.
    • It's a pretty dumb idea at the best of times to map trademarks onto domain names. Even in one country (even one US state), the same word can be trademarked by an unlimited number of companies, in different businesses.

      And .com is international or multinational commercial. So even if a trademark holder in the US can claim they should have trademark.co.us, how does that help them with a .com attempt? There are no international trademarks, so how can a local trademark be seen as claim to international names
  • a new site is born!

    CohenSexSucks.com

  • Of all the people in the world (Score:4, Funny)

    by _underSCORE ( 128392 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:34AM (#5918066) Homepage Journal
    Who I share a name with, why, oh why, did it have to be this jerk?

  • just remember (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Connie_Lingus ( 317691 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:34AM (#5918067) Homepage
    That there is no such thing as "bad" publicity, esp. in the adult industry...this is nothing more than a bunch of white noise to generate free advertisement for the guy.

    Wise up, /.!
  • Here [sex.com] is the original article. ;)

  • Star Chamber (Score:3, Funny)

    by HarveyBirdman ( 627248 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:44AM (#5918140) Journal
    This is exactly the kind of case where we need star chamber style justice. Both sides would just "disappear" one night, and valuable judicial resources would be freed up for important cases like the Catherine Zeta-Jones photograph controversey, and the class action lawsuits of the EFAs (Enourmously Fat-Assed) against the fast food industry.

  • The Neverending Sex.com Story? (Score:5, Funny)

    by deepstephen ( 149398 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @08:58AM (#5918236)
    Surely you mean tantric.com?

  • hey! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Joe the Lesser ( 533425 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @09:04AM (#5918284) Homepage Journal
    Why wasn't I warned that Sex.com [sex.com] wasn't work safe!!

  • What's the big deal? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tom7 ( 102298 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @09:15AM (#5918369) Homepage Journal

    As far as I can tell, neverendingsex.com is still available [internic.net] !

  • So "sex" is trademarket? (Score:4, Funny)

    by peter303 ( 12292 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @09:22AM (#5918437)
    Then you have to pay a royalty everytime you do sex?
  • From the article:

    For a fee of $1,000, Networks Solutions processed the domain name conversion and sex.com officially became Cohen's property.

    Wow. I sold my old domain a few years later (waste.com in '98 I think) and I don't recall a fee for the change at all (or it was a modest fee and the buyer paid).

  • He forged a signature. The man commited fraud. I say throw him in jail.
  • 1) find companies that did not go through the USPTO to protect the .com, .net or whatever attached to thier regular name.
    2) go through the USPTO and do it.
    3) Sue the company for use of your name
    4) Profit.

    I claim mcdonalds.com and mcdonalds.de see you at the USPTO offices.

  • WRONG! (Score:4, Funny)

    by peterpi ( 585134 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @10:13AM (#5918920)
    "This has to be the story which will never end. Back in 1996, Steven Cohen "stole" sex.com from it is original owner (Gary Kremen) by forging a letter to Network Solutions asking for the domain to be transferred to him."

    That doesn't make any sense. You might want to click here [google.com]

  • I've never looked at a trademark patent before, but what does it mean near the bottom, First use date, and First commerce use? Was this guy telling them in 1996 when he filed, that he had first used 'sex.com' in 1979? What?? Or am I missing something?
  • Observe that, generally, domain name urls take the form of TRADEMARK_NAME.com. So maybe this guy should get together with C|Net and start up a sex.com.com section for technologically discriminating adults. ;-)

  • Wrong TLD (Score:3, Funny)

    by DunbarTheInept ( 764 ) on Friday May 09, 2003 @01:10PM (#5920439) Homepage
    Shouldn't "sex" be an .org? Or, perhaps multiple .orgs
  • I wish there was a way both of these schmucks could lose. Fighting over sex.com bah

    I say no gnews is good gnews from gary gnu

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