Warning: Your Domain Name Could Infringe On Trademark Rights!

Warning: Your Domain Name Could Infringe On Trademark Rights!

Author: Al Martinovic

Warning: Your Domain Name Could Infringe On TrademarkRights! By Al MartinovicIf you have or are about to purchase a domain name, YOUcould be in trouble and you don't even know it yet...See, what the domain sellers won't tell you is that thedomain name you are purchasing or have purchased canpossibly infringe on trademark rights and you can losethat domain name or even worse.Trademark and servicemark laws apply not only off-linebut on-line as well and they even apply to domainnames.

Now, a trademark generally applies to goods where as aservicemark applies to services. For the purpose ofthis article I will refer to trademarks as the samerules apply.A trademark can be a word, name, symbol, or device andit is used to distinguish and indentify the goods andservices from one person or company from that ofanother.The purpose of a trademark is to prevent confusion inthe eyes of the consumer relating to particular goodsand services.

Basically, they are in place to preventunfair competition.So with that said, just because you purchased aparticular domain name it does not necessarily mean youhave exclusive rights to it.If there is a trademark in your domain name, the markowner has a legal right to send you a "cease anddesist" letter and possibly take that domain name awayfrom you.If you don't believe a word I've said so far then Ioffer myself as proof because it happened to me. Irecently lost one of my domain names under this exactsame circumstance.For legal reasons I can't tell you the domain name as Iagreed to make no further references to it, but therewere two words in my domain name that were associatedwith a trademark.Now, I wasn't aware of this when I purchased the domainname.

And I definitely wasn't aware of trademark laws.Don't be ignorant on the subject like I was. You canavoid any potential problems by educating yourself andthereby preventing the samething from happening to you.Don't make the same mistake that I did!Do your research before you buy a domain name and makesure there is NO trademark associated with that name.There are trademark search engines where you can typein a word or a phrase and it will tell you if it is atrademark.You can visit the United States Patent And TrademarkOffice (USPTO) website to do a trademark search:http://www.uspto.gov/Now, in my case I chose not to fight the trademarkdispute and gave up my domain name voluntarily.

I feltit just wasn't worth the time, money and headaches tolaunch a fight over this.If this should ever happen to you, you do have rightsand there are proper channels to go through to settlethe dispute. Contact a lawyer who specializes in thisfield.And don't even think for one minute that this sort ofthing can't happen to you. Trust me. If you have atrademark in your domain name it is only a matter oftime before you get that letter in the mail like I did.There are numerous cases all over the internetconcerning disputes over trademark and domain names.

Don't you be one of them...If you would like more information on the subject oftrademarks and domain names then I highly recommend youvisit this website:http://www.chillingeffects.org/domainThis article and any links associated with it are forinformational purposes only and not intended as legaladvice. As always, speak to an attorney who specializesin this field in the event of a dispute.Al Martinovic is the publisher of the MilleniumMarketers Newsletter where you will find powerfulinternet marketing concepts, killer strategies, usefultips and no bull business

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