Americans stealing .EUropean virtual properties?

[sasquatch]

Americans Bob Martin, Stuart Rabin, Marc Ostrofsky and the rest of their IREIT gang are stealing all the greatest .EUropean domains from Europeans themselves by using their phantom company (with a London address) called "First Internet Technology Ltd" through which they claim to have .EU (more specifically Netherlands domiciled) trademarks and therefore rights to all these domains:

(Note: data collected from http://www.whois.eu/ )

ads.eu
adsl.eu
art.eu
ask.eu
betting.eu
blackjack.eu
books.eu
broadband.eu
business.eu
camps.eu
cellphone.eu
chocolate.eu
chocolates.eu
computer.eu
computergames.eu
creditcards.eu
dating.eu
debt.eu
diet.eu
diets.eu
domains.eu
email.eu
euro.eu
euros.eu
fashion.eu
finance.eu
free.eu
freegames.eu
furniture.eu
game.eu
games.eu
hotel.eu
hotels.eu
jewelry.eu
love.eu
map.eu
maps.eu
mobi.eu
mortgage.eu
movies.eu
news.eu
poker.eu
rent.eu
roulette.eu
search.eu
seo.eu
software.eu
sports.eu
summercamps.eu
tickets.eu
travel.eu
vacation.eu
watches.eu
weather.eu
weightloss.eu
autoinsurance.eu
autotrader.eu
betonline.eu
car.eu
carhire.eu
carinsurance.eu
carloan.eu
carrental.eu
cars.eu
casino.eu
casinos.eu
cellular.eu
cellularphone.eu
cruise.eu
cruises.eu
diamond.eu
diamonds.eu
dietpill.eu
digitalcamera.eu
domainnames.eu
freeporn.eu
gay.eu
gays.eu
gold.eu
golf.eu
golfclub.eu
golfcourse.eu
golfequipment.eu
golfholiday.eu
holiday.eu
holidayinsurance.eu
homeinsurance.eu
homeloan.eu
job.eu
jobs.eu
laptop.eu
mobilephone.eu
mobilephones.eu
money.eu
mortgageloan.eu
motorinsurance.eu
music.eu
mutualfunds.eu
onlinebank.eu
onlinecasino.eu
onlinedating.eu
onlinedegree.eu
onlinepoker.eu
phonecards.eu
photo.eu
photographer.eu
photography.eu
porn.eu
porno.eu
printers.eu
ringtone.eu
ringtones.eu
securedloan.eu
travelinsurance.eu

Since they have been already accepted and granted rights for such valuable domains like Game.eu and Games.eu (and many others from this list),I guess my question is who is playing stupid here and why? Is it possible that out of so many applications for the same name, the one that always wins surely belong to those with deepest pockets, irregardless of their supposed (true) location and nationality?

[VisualDigits]

What would you expect? Money is power!

[Dimva]

This sucks, people like these guys should go to jail.. They using fake identity to get premium domains.. I only hope that Eu registrars stops frauds like stated and give the domains to rightfull owners.

[LazyD]

thats like saying no foreign person can own a .us ...this is the world we live in get used to it, our complaining won't do anything.

[WhoDatDog]

It's about time they got some good names.....I mean their website is iReit.com....try telling that to someone on the street and see if they ever find it. They are also going for those chocolate names again....millions of people care about chocolate I guess. They have a bunch of investors who put up millions and then they buy the names....stuff that monkeys could do.

I hope they make some noise though because when it comes to domains ALL PUBLICITY IS GOOD PUBLICITY....even Go-Daddy commercials.

This domain party is just getting started! I bought a name on this board a few months ago that I just turned down 5K for.....and I sell names to end users for thousands that sometimes don't even get bids here.....just keep buying good names and everything will work out.

[sasquatch]

It's about time they got some good names.....I mean their website is iReit.com....

Hahaha,

OUCH! %+|

[MrDude]

No matter what the US citizens still beleive, Just because they are not allowed, Its not right and I hope it backfires on them. Im going to personally contact eurid about every false application I can find

[Wot]

Yep, eurid and their toothless administrators Price Waterhouse have really had the wool pulled over their eyes - it is becoming a bigger joke everyday.

Just check whois eurid.eu and you will see than nearly every generic name has been allocated via these fabricated tm's- scandalous!

[mark]

Interesting..............wondering how many challenges to the registrations will be filed?

[NameYourself]

Ineresting..............wondering how many challenges to the registrations will be filed?

Probably a lot. However, if they decide in the first few cases upon extensive review and analysis, etc.. that it should go to someone else, everyone else will jump on the bandwagon and start challenging every other word out there, resulting in an absolute mess that I'm sure they don't want to or maybe don't even have the resources to deal with. They could even risk facing lawsuits from the original claimant to the name if they later decide it would be better suited with someone else. In such cases of generic words, I'd be willing to bet that challenges against generic words will not be won.

Also, in order to do this they had to get EU TMs on those generic words.. how is that possible? For instance, in the US you can TM a generic word, but it must be used for a product or service type that is not in an industry related to what the word means as a generic word.

[Ed30]

It's naive to suggest these trademarks are false. There are ways and means. They know the EU couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery. I say best of luck to them.

[Wot]

It's naive to suggest these trademarks are false. There are ways and means. They know the EU couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery. I say best of luck to them.

Interesting definition of fraud, though god forbid anybody may be guilty of that :

A deception deliberately practiced in order to secure "unfair" or unlawful gain.

All in the eye of the beholder.

[Ed30]

Where's the fraud?

[mole]

Okay, the Europeans can now steal .US :-D

[mark]

mole: lol

[rwmartin99]

Guys - Bob Martin - CEO of iREIT here. I appreciate the posting. Two things that I'm happy to certify:

1) iREIT has 0% ownership in any .eu names.
2) iREIT spent $0 on the .eu lottery.

Personally, I’m not sure that the time, effort and money spent on the .eu trademark lottery registration was a good investment holistically (but time may prove me wrong). (e.g. Because I'm not a believer in these domains from an investment perspective, nothing that I'm involved in, in any management / equity / ownership capacity made any investment in any .eu names).

As a note, we've purchased over three dozen portfolios and spent sizable sums of money on domain investments. We're always looking to purchase additional portfolios, and I welcome any direct comments to bmartin@ireit.com.

[StockDoctor]

Guys - Bob Martin - CEO of iREIT here. I appreciate the posting. Two things that I'm happy to certify:

1) iREIT has 0% ownership in any .eu names.
2) iREIT spent $0 on the .eu lottery.

Personally, I’m not sure that the time, effort and money spent on the .eu trademark lottery registration was a good investment holistically (but time may prove me wrong).

Hi Bob Thanks for posting, and welcome. You're input and commentary will prove interesting I'm sure.

On the thread topic, do you or your partners, or any afiliated companies to you, your partners or Ireit have any involvement at all in regging .eu names? Also, it sure would be great if Marc could pop in too, and maybe comment about his participation and super success in previous landrushes.

[pamela]

I emailed Bob to pop in and post a reply as I know that he would not invest in EU for now .

[sasquatch]

Guys - Bob Martin - CEO of iREIT here. I appreciate the posting. Two things that I'm happy to certify:

1) iREIT has 0% ownership in any .eu names.

But your phantom "European subsidiaries" (like "First Internet Technology Ltd." and "First European Technology Ltd." have (once these domains are fully granted to your subsidiaries by Eurid.)

In fact "First European Technology Ltd." lists Marc Ostrofsky of IREIT as contact, so I fail to understand how can you claim otherwise with such a straight face?

2) iREIT spent $0 on the .eu lottery.

Personally, I’m not sure that the time, effort and money spent on the .eu trademark lottery registration was a good investment holistically (but time may prove me wrong). (e.g. Because I'm not a believer in these domains from an investment perspective, nothing that I'm involved in, in any management / equity / ownership capacity made any investment in any .eu names).

???

"First European Technology Ltd." listing Marc Ostrofsky at IREIT as contact is listed as TM applican and .EU domains applicant in sunrise period for all those names posted previously. Furthermore Eurid accepted "First Internet Technology Ltd." as having valid claims on most of those domains, and FirstInternetTech.com (left as a contact email with Eurid) had IREITHOST.COM nameservers (and IREITHOST.COM lists you as an administrative contact) until today when they were somehow mysteriously changed to "marchex.com"!?

So allow me to be frank for a moment, and ask why are you playing dumb here?

[jberryhill]

chocolate.eu

Applicant
Name Ostrofsky Marc
Organisation First Internet Technology Ltd
Language English
Address 7 Chalcot Road
NW1 8LH London
United Kingdom
Phone +448.70068941
Email marc@ireit.com

Two things that I'm happy to certify:

1) iREIT has 0% ownership in any .eu names.
2) iREIT spent $0 on the .eu lottery.

Two things that nobody asked, you mean.

To the original poster and some of the people screaming "fraud" - There is absolutely nothing wrong with forming corporations in Europe, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with filing trademark applications in Benelux. Anyone who had looked at the rules for .eu names understood that taking those two steps were all that was required to apply for .eu names. The Benelux trademark system does not work the way the US trademark system does. If you have a problem with that, then your problem is with the people who wrote the rules, not with the people who followed the rules.

In fact "First European Technology Ltd." lists Marc Ostrofsky of IREIT as contact, so I fail to understand how can you claim otherwise with such a straight face?

He didn't "claim otherwise". What he did was a common thing that people who think they are clever often do in order to dodge a subject - say something that is very specifically true.

You can take it to the bank that the things he said numbered 1 and 2 above are likely to be absolutely and impeccably true. But if your question was intended more loosely as "are these guys applying for .eu names using one or more EU corporations and one or more Benelux TM applications?" then the answer is certainly yes, as anyone can determine from looking at the .eu whois data.