In what can only be described as a clown show of an X thread, one participant stood out as a shining example of why you do not take unsolicited legal advice.
You can read the whole thing on X.
TL;DR Startup named Camel (not a great brand imo because the tobacco company is so well known and you are never getting the .com)
Founder offers $200 for Camel.ai that owner paid $40K
Founder wants to know why they bought if not using it.
Founder’s cliche: “They are squatters” “Scammers” “Domains not used should be forfeited”
Domain Investors fire back, my reply was that it’s interesting an AI company wants to talk about morality. Use other people’s work to train your LLM/Ai but do not pay the content creators. That’s immoral.
Then we get the genius who gives the advice, file trademark, make a record of the squatter stating it has no intention to use. File a UDRP or ACPA. They left out commit fraud as the domain owner never stated they had not intention to never use.
John Berryhill entered the fray and replied to the non lawyer. https://twitter.com/Berryhillj/status/1821680680465498216
It looks like the startup registered a bunch of domain names at reg fee. UseCamel.com, Camel.sh, MyCamel.ai and a few others.
The .ai FAQ makes it clear that an intention to use is not a requirement for registration:
“Some people think that if someone else has registered a domain but is not really using it that they are “squatting” and there should be a way to take the domain from them but there is no such thing for “.ai” domains. If a domain is registered then as long as the registrant keeps paying, and are not doing anything in the previous section, they can keep the domain, even if they don’t really use it.”