2.
Industry Update
Negotiations
complete for .info and .biz
ICANN
this week announced that it had agreed contractual terms
with the two companies running the .info and .biz TLDs.
Providing no board members raise policy concerns about the
contracts over the next week, the deals will be signed,
subject to final approval by the US Department of Commerce.
These
are the first contracts to be completed – negotiations
with operators of the three ‘speciality’ domains, .aero,
.coop and .museum are still in the ‘formative’ stage,
with .pro and .name somewhat further advanced.
Chinese
domain name dispute heard in Beijing
This
week saw the Intermediate People’s Court of Beijing hear
an ownership dispute regarding a well-known Chinese domain
name – the first case of its kind in China.
The
accuser in the case applied to the State Administration of
Trademarks for registration of a combined trademark of
Chinese characters representing the word ‘Ali Ba Ba’. It
then invested 2 million yuan in publicising the trademark.
However, when the company tried to register the Chinese
domain name in January, it found that the China Internet
Network Information Center (CNNIC) had put it aside for
another company in advance. The case is pending for further
hearings.
Fulham FC
wins cybersquatting case
Fulham
Football Club has won a WIPO (World Intellectual Property
Organisation) case over the domain name fulhamfc.com. WIPO
ruled that the owner of the domain, Belize Domain Services,
had registered the domain in bad faith, having failed to do
anything with the domain since it was registered in May
1998. Fulham
argued that the words ‘Fulham FC’ constituted common law
and registered rights, and the judge agreed.
3.
NetNames
News
NetNames
in San Francisco
NetNames
will next week be at Stand 86 of the International Trademark
Attorney’s (INTA) meeting in the Marriott & Mascone
Convention Center in San Francisco, previewing its new
Global Domain Management Service (GDMS) suite of products.
If you are in the area or at the convention, please feel
free to stop by and take a look.
Next
week we’ll bring you more news on registration of .info
and .biz, whose registries will be making announcements at
the show
.
4.
Fact of the Week
Ebay tops
Amazon in online traffic rankings
Ebay,
the online auction site, has surpassed Amazon.com in the
battle for online traffic, according to Nielsen NetRatings.
With 22.13 million visitors in March, up 4 million from
February, Ebay is now the most visited online retailer.
Amazon had 22.08 million visitors in March, up 1 million
from February. Ebay also outscores Amazon in terms of pages
viewed and average time spent per visitor to the site.
5.
Tip of the Week
When
launching new products and services, check for domain name
availability before naming them, and making any
announcements public. This will ensure that problems with
cybersquatters are kept to a minimum and your brands can be
effectively developed on the Internet.
To
check availability of a particular domain name, simply enter
the name into the search function of any reputable domain
name registrar’s Whois database, e.g. www.netnames.co.uk
