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David versus Goliath?

Posted on 06 December 2006 by


Here’s an interesting question for you to ponder…

If you create a website using an untrademarked name, and the name is later trademarked by another company, can you be forced to give up your site?

vincent-nguyen

Read Vincent Nguyen’s story, and see what you think.

Here is an update and a little bit more clarification for those that are interested.

This post was written by:

- who has written 1699 posts on Gear Diary.

I started Gear Diary on September 30, 2006, and my goal was that this not be an easily labeled site. We all have gear that we use daily – some of it electronic and some of it organic. I think it is fascinating to explore the equipment that makes our lives easier, more entertaining, more productive, and more manageable. My hope is that Gear Diary visitors will find this site to be a comfortable and friendly place to discuss interesting topics – and not only those that are tech related, as well as a location to discover various types of gear – whatever that term may end up implying – that they never knew existed. My specialty is in-depth reviews written in a layman’s terms, because everyone can understand technology, sometimes it just takes a little translating. +Judie Stanford

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  • MitchellO

    Interesting story, and while I agree he registered the domain name first, he was asking for trouble considering he did it AFTER the RAZR was released.

  • Orion

    That’s true. Maybe he has a leg to stand on, but I’m not certain of trademark law in terms of whether its protections are retroactive. I mean, Moto WAS awarded the trademark, afterall.

    But he also has something to protect. However, if Moto is indeed awarded the rights to the URL, no one would want this to become an example that allows things to get out of hand where companies can take a website name, trademark it, and rip the URL right out from under the feet of the “Davids”, so to speak, anytime they choose.

    So one question could be, “Whether they currently are or aren’t, should trademark protections be retroactive, or should people or businesses that register domain names automatically be extended some sort of trademark rights and protection to the URL (providing it hasn’t been previously trademarked by someone else)?”

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