Well now this UDRP/trademark thing is officially just getting silly.
The domain name Stages.com, a generic domain name by any measure, has been hit with a UDRP after the domain was purchased in January for Over $14k, by a company that just filed for a trademark last week.
The UDRP was filed by Foundation Fitness LLC which filed a trademark on the term “Stages” way back on June 12, 2015.
Oh by the way that was just 7 days ago.
Today is June 19th.
The domain name was sold on Sedo in January for just $14,500 a pretty good bargain for the buyer in our opinion.
The “original” registration date for Stages.com is back in 2001 but Foundation Fitness LLC is trying to grab a domain based on a trademark registered just last week.
The trademark holder is claiming first use of 2011.
We are noticing more and more of these UDRP filed on domain names once they are sold, but this one with its recent registration seems to be pushing the bounds.
Really Hard.
The domain name is going to a zero parking solution where the URL winds up going to a different site with each click.
We will keep our eye on this one
I would think the first use date of 2011 is all that really matters. The bigger issue though is that Stages.com is a very very generic domain, that could be used for a lot of different things (plays, concerts stages, life coaching [stages of life], old Western stage coaches, companies that stage houses for sale with furniture, etc., so unless they can prove the buyer knew about the trademark (which had not been registered yet), this seems like a hard case for the trademark holder to win.
Here’s a few things I found:
The FoundationFitness.net website says “Foundation Fitness launched the Stages Cycling brand and expanded their revolutionary crank-based power measurement system into the outdoor cycling community in 2012.”
Domains StagesCycling.com and StagesIndoorCycling.com were both registered (and last updated) in 2010.
The company appears to have 2 registered trademarks for the phrase “Stages Cycling” and 2 applications for the same phrase with registration pending. And now they’ve applied for “Stages”, possibly to introduce an entire line of products to be branded under that term, as they already have with “cycling”.
However, I feel it’s a HUGE leap of faith by Foundation Fitness LLC to expect to win a UDRP on a domain like Stages.com, based on this VERY recent TM filing. And the company may be confronted with a RDNH determination as well.
This is exactly why there should be a stiff fine-with the money put in escrow in advance if you don’t win the dispute you bring. Let them put up $5,000 or $10,000. Don’t win-you’re out the money.
They don’t even own or use foundationfitness.com yet they are filing a UDRP on stages.com. Classy.
What does that mean? The clicks are being directly converted to revenue, right?
Never heard the term, zero parking, before. There is a subsidiary of SiliconHouse.net, zer0parking.com, which may have offered that type. If you google, zero parking, few results supply an exact match.
Yep what was my previous comment on another udrp. Another day a nother stupid filing.
We had a call from a “TM holder” asking to purchase a domain and when the price came out he started threatening us with an action. While we were talking I looked his application up and it had just been granted 2 days before. The domain was 13 years old and his tm was exactly what we’d been using the domain for in the past 13 years.
I told him he could pound salt and if he wasn’t careful I’d get his tm dismissed. I guess some lawyer must have talked sense into him cause I never heard back from him again.
But putting a penalty into the udrp for reverse hijacking would be an awesome thing. We have that on the .ca (up to 5k) and it stops a lot of this nonsense in it’s tracks.
That’s why it is advisable to make use of an attorney that is well versed in domain law when contemplating on a UDRP.
Case as this , the attorney maybe misleaded his client ! Should fine them together or both list on Hallofshame for lifetime ….