Quote:
Originally Posted by domaingenius  Yes good idea, I have just asked lawyer to do that immediately.
DG |
Well if you read the decision, the panel suggested you do that.
Not reading information relevant to your business is not a good idea. Acting on the basis of emotional impulses - "that stuff just bothers me" - is a poor long term strategy.
The panelist reminded you to notify the registrar:
Second, the Policy contemplates situations under which a Panel decision may be implemented even after a Court action has been filed, including if the Court action is later dismissed or if Respondent fails to provide a file-stamped copy of the complaint to the Registrar within ten days. Policy, paragraph 4(k).
Now, if you had read the decision, which you've had for several days, you wouldn't be here several days after the fact, gathering it was a "good idea" to do what the decision expressly reminded you to do.
Unsurprisingly, the panelist said pretty much what I had predicted in connection with filing a TM application after there was reason to believe there would be a dispute:
Respondent acquired this domain name on November 16, 2008, just ten days after Complainant issued a press release announcing that it was rebranding itself as ESSQUE HOTELS. One day later, Complainant received an emailed offering to sell the Domain Name. In light of this chronology, the Panel infers that Respondent sought to acquire this Domain Name because of the value it would have to Complainant and then, either using the alias or working with Mr. Rumaiji, caused an offer to be communicated to Complainant to sell the Domain Name for $4,750, a sum that exceeds the price Respondent paid for the Domain Name. That Mr. Rumaiji is linked to Respondent through the domain name <blastdoors.co.uk> is persuasive proof that Respondent was behind this offer.
All of Respondent’s efforts since the Complainant’s rejection of that offer – including the posting of a simple webpage that purports to sell electronics, the filing of a UK trademark application, and the Respondent’s offer to purchase Complainant’s domain name <essque.net> – appear to have been designed to create a pretext of trademark rights, but the Panel finds them unpersuasive. Rather than show some legitimate interest in ESSQUE as a Domain Name for an electronics retailer, these steps (along with Respondent’s unsuccessful effort to distance himself from Mr. Rumaiji’s effort to sell the Domain Name) reinforce the Panel’s view that Respondent is a cybersquatter who has concocted a process to try to extract maximum value from Complainant for this Domain Name while masking his cybersquatting conduct.
If this case proceeds to litigation, Complainant may well have an opportunity to test the bona fides of Respondent’s claimed interest. For now, on the record in this proceeding, it appears to the Panel that Respondent’s only interest in this Domain Name was to try to sell it to a trademark owner and not to genuinely run an electronics business. Accordingly, the Panel concludes that Complainant has sustained its burden of proving that Respondent lacks rights or a legitimate interest in the Domain Name.