Could buying VirginIslands.co trademark infringement?

Thoriso · Mar 31, 2011

I am looking into .co's but I am weary of trademark infringements. I noticed that people/businesses trademark places like Virgin Islands which is both a place and a trademarked item (currently Dead status)

Ofcourse the domain I am looking at is NOT VirginIslands.co but it suits this discussion. If I could have bought VirginIslands.co to develop as a real estate blog with Ads while the TM was alive did the owner have any recourse even though Virgin Islands specialized in alcoholic bevarages. (shown here: http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4003:j3omv2.3.43)

Please help with any info.

snicksnack · Mar 31, 2011

I am not a lawyer, but my common sense says, they could not get you on TM infrigement, as you would be in "real estate" about an existing place.

Thoriso · Mar 31, 2011

That sucks because the search in such cases is high without big competition for SEO. I had a feeling you would say that.
Thanks for the validation though. Such a wasted opportunity.

snicksnack · Mar 31, 2011

Thoriso said:
That sucks because the search in such cases is high without big competition for SEO. I had a feeling you would say that.
Thanks for the validation though. Such a wasted opportunity.

sorry don't get it. Why does it suck ? If they cannot get you on TM issue, then you are good to go.

Thoriso · Mar 31, 2011

Sorry, didn't explain well. The .co domain I am looking at is a real estate trademark and my expertise is real estate blogs. I looked carefully at the patent and they are registered for the entire domain name. They own the .com .net and .org of the TM term and their lawyers are a big law firm in New York. They have not registered the .co domain. The phrase is in their logos, everywhere but the phrase is high level and describes a place. It can be branded as yaghting, renting, travel anything and these greedy bastards TM blocked it.

The only brave soul owns the .biz and he does not even display his name. Just Urlcollection.com as the administrator name and contact.

I could file a TM in South Africa and go for it but the blog will have to talk about real estate in their neighborhood and its a multi million dollar neighborhood. Thats why I didn't even discuss this openly in the Platinum forum.

The thing that bugs me is that this is a great opportunity to "play" with something worthwhile and build an online identity.