trademark/copyright infringement complaint regarding my domain

[SixTimesEight]

I received this email from Domains By Proxy regarding a domain name I registered two months ago that has "<a trademarked word" in it. I haven't gotten any emails from the <the company> yet, but I only got this one ten minutes ago and it's only a matter of time I'm sure.

I also have one other domain with "<the trademark>" in it that I haven't been contacted about as of yet.

I'm not sitting on them waiting for <the company> to buy them from me. I had legitimate plans for them when I registered them. They're not particularly fantastic names that I am willing to fight over, but do I have any ground to stand on?

Should I even bother?

[Moderator Note: It's not a good idea to specify the trademark, when seeking input, in a public forum.]

[edited by: Webwork at 2:36 pm (utc) on Aug. 10, 2007]
[edit reason] Please - No email quotes per WebmasterWorld TOS [/edit]

[Quadrille]

If you knowingly registered a trademarked word, intending to gain monetarily by the association, then - surprise, surprise - you do not have a leg to stand on, wherever you are in the world, with just a handful of exceptions, such as Myanmar.

Trademark protection is big business, and unless you have very deep pockets, don't even think about fighting a battle you 99.9999999% certainly will lose.

This has been true for about seven years; whoever advised you in this matter is either ignorant, or no friend.

Think about it; if your company name was 'Widgets!'; established for years and you'd spent a fortune promoting it, on and off the web, including paying a fortune to trademark it all over the world, how would you feel if someone came along and set up a website called widgets-cheaper-here.com? Wouldn't you feel that a small investment in lawyers fees was an excellent investment to protect your property?

And if your use was 'innocent' (often very difficult to prove, but theoretically possible), consider this. Widgets! Inc MUST chase you as hard as they chase the scammers; because if they allow just one infringement of their trademark, the scammers will use that as a precedent. Owning a trademark REQUIRES the owner to protect it. In all cases, in all weather. Or they'll lose everything.

[edited by: Quadrille at 12:23 pm (utc) on Aug. 10, 2007]

[SixTimesEight]

Thank you for your input Quadrille, it's really appreciated.

I was not advised in any way on this matter. The ignorance is mine alone.

If this company really wants these domains I will hand them over without a fight as they aren't worth much to me aside from the registration fees.

After looking around a bit I found several websites using domain names with trademarked terms such as Google and Microsoft. I doubt they are all flying under the radar so there must be legal gray areas.

[Quadrille]

There are several at any given moment; few are there for long, and any that get any kind of 'success' get stamped on smartish.

The gray area is permission / license. For example, Google are happy to have some forums related to their content using their name. And I'm sure they watch closely. If such sites became google-bashers, I'll bet the license would fall quicker than a search for 'doomed'.

I'm certainly not insisting there are no legal gray areas - but I've never heard of one! Few cases these days come to court, but those that do always seem to get won by the trademark owner.

I've noticed in ebay forums idiots spamming various ebay-***.com domains which are ebay bashing - most have gone before I even get to view; web hosts don't want to get caught in the crossfire.

BTW, I'm no lawyer etc., etc., but I have followed this topic with morbid interest since 1999!