Is this unethical?

domain name similar to competitor

[nonprofit]

My client has a competitor who's name is in the form "Widgets New Mexico" and operates under the site name www.widgetsnewmexico.com.

"Widgets" is a very common word, and I recently had my client register "www.widgetsnm.com." We immediately saw 6 percent of traffic start to come through that domain name, even though that domain is not listed on any index or anywhere in print. We are obviously benefitting from traffic meant to go to www.widgetsnewmexico.com.

Do you think this was unethical? The domain name widgetsnm.com has been available for many years, and up to this point led the user nowhere.

[Buckley]

I dont see any problem with that at all, particuly if where talking about common words and places.

[TheWebographer]

Yes, I think it is unethical. In fact, I would think the owners of the other domain could possibly be awarded your new domain plus all profits you made from it. Especially since it is obvious why you purchased the domain in the first place and it obvious what your domain name is intended to mean.

We had a similar problem with our domain name. Orgionally it was something like "ourcounty-news.com". Note the dash, because there IS a dash in the name of our newspaper which was established in 1837.

Someone decided they could register "ourcountynews.com" without the dash and then cash in on some traffic meant for us. Wrong. All that happened is that we got free registration for two years (paid by the squatter) when he was forced to hand it over to us.

Simply using a state abbreviation instead of the full state name another business uses IMHO can lead to alot of trouble.

[madweb]

Hello,

to help us in our evaluation, the following questions are relevant.

1) Is widgetsnewmexico.com:

• (a) just a keyword domain for a company called "trevor", "billy" or something else that isn't "widgestnewmexico";
  
• (b) the name of the company trading at that domain;
  
• (c) a trademark of the company trading at that domain?

2) Is widgetsnm.com:

• (a) trading something completely differnent to widgetsnewmexico.com;
  
• (b) trading in the same industry as widgetsnewmexico.com;
  
• (c) competing directly with the products or services of widgetsnewmexico.com?

3) Are widgets:

• A common noun such as "computer", "tree" or "monkey" which describes your product;
  
• A word such as "amazon", "overture" or "go" which is common but does not describe your products or services;
  
• A tradename that has become a regular noun such as "thermos flask" or "hoover"?

[Dynamoo]

Is "Widgets" a trademark or part of a trademark held by the the owners of widgetsnewmexico.com?

[nonprofit]

The competitor has no trademark on its name. It simply operates under "Widgets New Mexico" and widgetsnewmexico.com -- and it only uses that name and domain name, nothing else. Since we also sell widgets in New Mexico, I thought it would be OK to buy widgetsnm.com.

I'm not sure if you would say we compete directly with Widgets New Mexico. I don't want to go into details, but we don't compete head to head, although our products are quite similar. People who buy from Widgets New Mexico often buy from us as well, but buying from one of us would never preclude or substitute for buying from the other.

Widgets is a common noun which describes the product. It is not a trademark name that has come into common usage, just a noun.

[mrguy]

--Widgets is a common noun which describes the product. It is not a trademark name that has come into common usage, just a noun.--

Sounds to me like you OK then.

Common Noun, No trademark = No Case

[jrobbio]

The question however that you asked was whether it was ethical or not to do this. I think the site name is different enough to be acceptable, but if you had gone down the dash road like webographer talked about then I would say that was unfair practice although I see it everywhere I look. mrguy correctly points out that the site name contains a common noun and a region and just becaues the influence to have the domain name was because of an indirect competitor, they don't have the right to own it.

[MetropolisRobot]

A very gray area, but legally probably safe. For all people know NM could stand for Next Millenium. Could be a happy chance that you are getting New Mexico related traffic.

Given the apparent ease with which other companies in this world can say "more X than company Y" then it seems to me that domain grabs that do not use a registered trademark are simply an extension of your right to advertise in a "comparative" manner.

[madweb]

Seems fine to me.

I'd also buy nmwidgets.com, nm-widgets.com, wigets-nm.com. You'd probably get some type-ins from those domains, and would be protecting your widgetsnm brand identity by making sure all those similair domains point to your website.

(this is not spam if it is done in the propper way; you could put a client-side redirect with noindex,follow on your spare domains)