After Trademark Threat, LameBook.com Files Preemptive Suit Against FaceBook.com

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TechCrunch this morning is reporting that a site called LameBook filed for a declaratory judgment in its home state of Texas against Facebook.com asking the court to find it is not infringing on Facebook’s trademark.

According to the story upon receiving communications from Facebook.com that it believed LameBook.com violated it trademark, instead of waiting for the federal lawsuit to come, Lamebook suited its own suit presumptively.

Of course as domain holders we have the option of doing the exact same thing upon receipt of a C & D letter.  Instead of waiting for the UDRP to come we can file a federal lawsuit seeking a declaratory judgment.

With the inconsistent decisions coming out of UDRP world, this maybe an option you will start seeing some bigger domains moving to in the near future.

About Michael Berkens

Michael Berkens, Esq. is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of TheDomains.com. Michael is also the co-founder of Worldwide Media Inc. which sold around 70K domain to Godaddy.com in December 2015 and now owns around 8K domain names . Michael was also one of the 5 Judges selected for the the Verisign 30th Anniversary .Com contest.

Comments

  1. M. Menius says

    Just visited Lamebook.com. My initial reaction when reading this post was that Facebook may be over-reaching. But when I visited Lamebook, it was obvious that Lamebook are playing off of Facebook’s success even duplicating their logo and website layout.

    So on this one, Lamebook look guilty, and are wrong for trying to exploit Facebook. They are creating confusion in the public with the identical Facebook logo and web design.

  2. Einstein says

    MHB, there’s a lot more to this than Lamebook in the domain but it’s a great idea to preempt.

    Where would you file, your place of residence?

  3. tricolorro says

    Lamebook is claiming trademark rights by use of the ™
    symbol.

    Lamebook .com’s logo includes the tagline:

    “the funniest and lamest of Facebook®”

    It seems there niche is “make fun of” type sites.

    I don’t know if ownership is related but on Lamebook you’ll see links to parody .COM sites:

    PeopleOfWalmart -funny pictures at Walmart
    –
    Regretsy -where DIY meets WTF
    –
    LateNightMistakes
    –
    WTFTattoos
    –
    YouDriveWhat
    –
    WhiteTrashRepairs
    –
    etc. etc.