Copyright & Trademark Infringement: Domain Names

[mattyk50]

Hi there anyone,

ive just received a letter from a company called "A Quick Sale", claiming Copyright & Trademark Infringement due to me registering the domain name "Quicksalehouses.co.uk", as theirs is www.a-quick-sale.co.uk and they have registered "AQUICK SALE" as a trademark.

i had never even heard of this company before registering the domain for my business. and i only decided on this domain as it is a good search term for my business!

can anyone advise on my position??

thanks in advance

Matt

 

[Alpha]

Hi there anyone,

ive just received a letter from a company called "A Quick Sale", claiming Copyright & Trademark Infringement due to me registering the domain name "Quicksalehouses.co.uk", as theirs is www.a-quick-sale.co.uk and they have registered "AQUICK SALE" as a trademark.

i had never even heard of this company before registering the domain for my business. and i only decided on this domain as it is a good search term for my business!

can anyone advise on my position??

thanks in advance

Matt

IMO that is desperate BS on their behalf, I can't believe they'd win that.

write back and tell them you are starting a chain of Ale Houses called "Quicks" and the domain is actually QuicksAleHouses

 

[mattyk50]

the letter continues,

"Your use of the name “QuickSale” and the domain name, ‘www.quicksalehouses’ are clearly similar to our client’s trade mark and designed to trade on our client’s reputation and goodwill, and to mislead or confuse members of the public into believing that the services which you supply are those supplied by our client or are else associated with our client, or are sold with its endorsement or approval."


they have set a deadline of 28th of July for me to hand over the domain name to them, and pay their legal expenses

Matt

 

[retired_member16]

Cool.

Screw it up and put it in the bin. Or, as always, PM your price if you want to sell.

 

[mattyk50]

are you saying that the trademark of "AQUICK SALE" doesnt leave them with much of a legal leg to stand on with regards to my quicksalehouses.co.uk site then?

 

[guy martin]

You might be ok if you registered your domain before they obtained their trademark. I believe that's ok, but someone may be better informed and may correct me on this.

Regards
Guy

 

[Jeewhizz]

They haven't a leg to stand on imo - and no 'expert' would find the same I would hope

If you don't want the hassle, there are people here who will buy it at a nominal fee off you...

 

[mattyk50]

its not so much the hassle of the legal issue, its the hassle of having to change all my website design/ logo, etc if i change my domain name!

 

[enworb]

To me AQUICK SALE and QUICKSALEHOUSES are totally different.

Surely they can't TM such popular generic words.

Personally I think they are annoyed that yours is a better name than theirs. I'd hold onto it if I were you...or at the very least auction it on Sedo. I wouldn't even consider transferring to that company because they will probably use that name from now on

 

[mattyk50]

would you reply to this legal letter then?

ps - feel free to PM me if you would like a read of it in full!

 

[Nigel]

I think you need to take a look at the Trademark register. There are two entries for 'a quick sale' See here:

http://www.ipo.gov.uk/tm/t-find/t-f...assselected=99&crosssearch=Y&statusselected=A

I'm no trademark expert (perhaps Beasty can give some insight on this) but it may be significant that the original trademark application for the term 'A QUICK SALE' for a WO trademark was withdrawn and the only trademark registered under term 'A QUICK SALE' is for a DW trademark.

I have always thought that a WO trademark gives exclusive rights to a term wheras a DW trademark is for simply trademarking the term in the form of a logo or image. It would be very helpful if someone with a legal brain could clarify this situation. In any event I would strongly recommend that you take some legal advice on this before responding.

 

[mattyk50]

thanks nigel. i'll have a chat to my sisters who is a solicitor at the the weekend.

keep the replies coming in the mean time though. its helping me get a picture of what my situation is

Matt

 

[Nigel]

Handy having a sister who is a solicitor - lucky you

 

[mattyk50]

an interesting development, while i have been having a look on whois...

the email from a-quick-sale about this matter came from a "Glenn Ackroyd" at a-quick-sale.

The attachement to the email was the legal letter from a company called firstlegal.org.uk

ive had a look at the site for first legal, and its just a holding page - but who is it registered to on whois.... a Mr Glenn Ackroyd

 

[grandin]

Expert

Nominet has created a contract based on opinions not clauses. A DRS expert has been empowered to do as he or she likes....the rights test is low and not subject to english law.....chuckle says the mediator

Ah...but lets all be thankful as so many Government departments having been sitting on the PAB and observing the DRS for years. Surely 35 legal DRS experts can't be wrong....can they? they wouldn't put a name to a 3 million word consumer contract would they??? A crappy contract wouldn't be issued with a crystal mark...would it? The judge wouldn't get his facts wrong...would he?

Alas....its not what you know its who you know

Lee

 

[mattyk50]

and that means what, exactly??

 

[GWing]

they don't have a leg to stand on,

didn't the easy group already go thorugh this and lose.

Hense they tried tp stop easygolf.co.uk

as long as nobody uses orange and the word easy they are fine.

And if easy group couldn't stop it, I doubt this bunch of idiots can.

Although that was a court decision and not a DRS decision. DRS decisions are often made from a panel of people on their knees.

 

[rob]

an interesting development, while i have been having a look on whois...

the email from a-quick-sale about this matter came from a "Glenn Ackroyd" at a-quick-sale.

The attachement to the email was the legal letter from a company called firstlegal.org.uk

ive had a look at the site for first legal, and its just a holding page - but who is it registered to on whois.... a Mr Glenn Ackroyd

Did the letter claim 'firstlegal.org.uk' was a solicitor / legal company?

 

[grandin]

it means

it means very little until many more court cases....DRS on the one hand is good.... it prevents massive legal bills and the majority of complaints are in respect to obvious abuse....however once in a while you get a large coporate who puts his welly in on something he/she does not have unequivocal rights to and for some reason they win....the reason for the win is not derived from the contract clauses as such but more so from the opinion of the expert. I don't see how a expert can be negligent as he/she is not (under the DRS) confined to english law or any contract term apart from....

does the complainant have rights

and

in his/her opinion has the actions of registrant taken unfair advantage of the complainants rights

This second limb is not confined to any list even though point 3 of the policy gives weight to a certain number of reasons....I recently discussed this issue with someone from Nominet and they implied these are the most common BUT as I said to him.. most common does not give reason to provide extra exposure over another reason....there is no hierarchy of reasons therefore point 3 of the policy is misleading.

The most interesting application of this was the ghd.co.uk case...The original expert referred to a previous drs case (he was the expert but did not disclose the fact) he moved the registrants rights date from the date of registration...Nominet clearly defines that on the day of registration you derive a right of use... is the expert negligent?....no cause he/she has been empowered to do whatever he/she likes cause your whole contract is based on a experts opinion who is not subject to anything apart from his/her own morals...

NB...I also said to the Nominet person that the reasons for abuse should be a longer list...the person said the list would be enormous and therefore not practical....ah I said.....at the moment the list is contained deep within the 3 million word drs archive isn't it?.....i am sure its Nominets duty to extract that list ins't it (or ignore it and hope the problem goes away)? i.e. even if the list was 1 million words instead of 3 million it would be less misleading....the list is currently 6 paragraphs approx!

Lee

 

[mattyk50]

so what should i say then??