Melinda Gates is a billionaire and one of the world’s most powerful women, according to Forbes, but she lost a complaint under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) for the domain name <melindagates.com>. In a new video, Doug Isenberg explains why she lost and what lessons other trademark owners – women, men, and companies of every size – can learn from this case.
The Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) may be the best and most popular way for trademark owners to fight cybersquatters – but it’s not the only option. In fact, a domain name dispute filed by a large law firm on its own behalf provides a good lesson about the pros and cons of going to court instead of filing a UDRP complaint.
In the second quarter 2022 edition of GigaLaw's Domain Dispute Digest, something unusual happen: A significant spike in the number of decisions not only under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) — but also under the Uniform Rapid Suspension System (URS). However, while the number of URS cases was up, trademark owners didn't fare so well, winning only only 69.1 percent of URS cases in the quarter, as compared with a more than 95 percent success rate under the UDRP.
Getting a winning decision in a Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) case is obviously what every trademark owner wants when it files a complaint — but the decision itself is not the end of the process. Instead, an order to transfer a domain name simply kicks off what should be the last stage of the dispute, but still, every trademark owner needs to be aware of at least three important issues to ensure that the domain name is actually transferred.
Why does Doug Isenberg publish videos about domain name disputes for his GigaLaw website — and how does he create them? Doug answers those questions (and provides a lot of other behind-the-scenes details about his legal practice) in this documentary, a highly personal project where viewers can see what Doug looks like and what he does “off camera.”
In this video, I discuss a UDRP decision in which the disputed domain name was registered 26 years before the complainant obtained a trademark registration. While that timeline usually makes it impossible to establish "bad faith," this case was more complicated because the registrant of the domain name changed hands, so the panel discussed whether it was subject to "an unbroken chain of possession."
Download GigaLaw’s Domain Dispute Digest
The number of decisions under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP), increased 20% in the first quarter of 2022, while the number of actual domain names in those cases rose almost 32%, contributing to an ongoing surge in domain name disputes that is continuing for a ninth consecutive year.
That’s just one of the important takeaways from the newest issue of GigaLaw’s Domain Dispute Digest for the first quarter of 2022, which I discuss in a new YouTube video.
For all of the details, you can download a full copy of the 10-page report from my GigaLaw website.
The Digest captures and analyzes data from most of the UDRP service providers, including WIPO, the largest provider, which was responsible for about 60 percent of the decisions in the quarter.
Not surprisingly, about 95% of all UDRP decisions in the quarter resulted in outcomes favorable to trademark owners, demonstrating that the UDRP remains an incredibly effective tool to use against cybersquatters.
But under the Uniform Rapid Suspension System (URS), fewer than 75% of decisions last quarter favored trademark owners, which proves the point I have been making for years: The URS is a much less desirable dispute policy, and apparently most brand owners agree. Although the number of URS cases was up about 16% in the quarter, there were only 36 URS decisions, as compared with more than 1,700 under the UDRP.
The most commonly disputed top-level domains under the UDRP in the quarter were:
.com
.net
.org
.online
.shop
.xyz
.store
.info.
.club
For more details, data, and lists, watch the video or download the Digest.
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The GigaLaw Firm helps companies of all sizes protect their brands online, using domain name dispute policies – such as the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) – and other legal tools available to copyright and trademark owners on the Internet.
