Re: [ga] More UDRP Proceedings

["Bret A. Fausett" <baf@fausett.com>]

Ellen Rony wrote:
> It's interesting that in two of the new proceedings, the domain names were
> registered in January and December 1995, respectively.  I'm disturbed by
> the notion that a domain registrant's remains vulnerable to a challenge in
> perpetuity.

You raise an interesting point. As you probably know, under U.S. law, some
trademark registrations become incontestable after a period of time. Given
the amount of money now going to build an online presence (according to one
recent study the *average* cost for a new e-commerce site exceeds U.S.
$1,000,000), protecting a domain name after a similar period of continuous
and unchallenged use might make sense.

While Harald is probably right that, as a practical matter, a long period of
use makes the challenger's task in a UDRP proceeding daunting, shouldn't a
domain name owner have some certainty after a long period of use that their
name will not be taken away?

We talk a lot about stability of the Internet. I would think this goal would
be furthered by giving domain name owners an incontestable right in their
name after a period of long, continuous, unchallenged use.

        -- Bret