There is a big group of companies and they already own <famousBrand>.com which is like a portal website for their member companies most of whom share the <famousBrand> followed by, say Chemical, Electric, Bank etc.
<famousBrand>.org, <famousBrand>.net ... seem to be owned by speculators/cybersquatters.
<famousBrand>.ws was the unwanted child, nobody wanted it so I bought it from a discount registrar without any competition. It seem like it was previously owned by a small business.
My goal is to develop <famousBrand>.ws as one of the sites to criticize <famousBrand>. Public service, no commercial purpose, no intent to deceive visitors - will be stated very clearly on the site. Will I be forced to give back the site to them?
Why did I get <famousBrand>.ws? Simple, just for SEO purpose. I guessed a single keyword will help in ranking. It's an extremely competitive term and every small bit counts.
Should i keep it or throw it away?
Since you would be registering the .ws because of the .com version of the name, if the .com owners decided to file a dispute to WIPO or ICANN, you wouldn't have a hope of winning, based upon what you said.
Here are some other similar threads regarding similar domain names, and you'll find additional information there:
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]
My defence is:
1. dot ws site is non-commercial.
2. It is not designed to confuse the visitors. It's main purpose is to be optimized for Google and other SEs which seem to like single keyword domain names. If I select any other name my chances of coming in the top 10 or even top 50 positions are going to be diminished, which is not fair to me.
I think I will point this name to another site and see what happens.
1. dot ws site is non-commercial.
This isn't really a defense. Just means if it went through the courts, that you wouldn't have to hand over any money that you earned from the site over to the owners of the .com ;) You could technically still be held for damages, though.
You can point it to another site for a while and see what happens. If no C&D appears with that, they may not be interested in going after those who have the non-com versions of the name.
But as you said they have deep pockets and I don't have any pockets. :)
Is the name a registered trademark? (You can check the trademark database).
I would definitely dread *very* lightly. But if they C&D you once you have a site built, make sure it is one you can easily move onto another non-trademark name domain.
www.<brandName>.com was registered in past but is Dead now.
Same with <brandName>.com (without the www.)
I am guessing that either www.<brandName>.com or <brandName>.com are their default property rights but once they have it they cannot go after everyone who has that name followed by still existing or yet to come, possibly millions of dot <something>.
I will try to promote www.<brandname>.ws and not just <brandname>. :)
The legal system has made it easier for them to do this and remove the need for them to register every possible domain.
Recently in the UK Boots the chemist successfully sued and took ownership of boots-com from an ISP also called Boots.
However the DVLA, Driver Vehicle Licencing Authority lost a case to take over dvla-com because dot com is commercial and the authority (dvla) is a British government office.
So even the Government don't win every case and each case it taken on its own merits.
In case of dot com wars I can see that companies want that site since "com" has become related to commercial sites. They already have the dot com site. Now the new dot ws site was available for long time, they didn't take it. For mw "ws" stands for "Watch and Sucks" - reserved for such sites. ;)
Try not to work on the basis that 'it was there for the taking, but they didn't take it'.
If you registered say, woolworths. whatever or easyjet. dot whatever because they didn't ... you may be in front of men-in-wigs - dot com:0
If they are not abolished:)
I know, I know. ;) A new line of defence - single word domain names are the best for Google-SEO, is the one I am thinking of.
Who would want to defend a .WS they have no value at all, and try to find some .WS sites on Google there is only one that i know of, probably more but it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.
