| Author | Message | ||
     Skyguy |
Hi all, I don't know if anyone has any info or insight on this one but I have to ask. I am trying to name my hot air balloon company and I constantly run into a company that has bought up thousands of names and resell them at very high (1000's) prices. I thought this was illegal? Can I force them to give me a squatted name if I name my business the same? Reason I ask is I want the domain apollo air. | ||
| Darthane |
Capitalism in action. -=shrugs=- | ||
| Smcnamara |
If you have a Trademark on Apollo Air, you might have success filing a legal suit and following up with ICANN on the UDRP (Uniform Domain Resolution Policy.) If you don't have the name trademarked, you may be SOL but still might have some possiblity since the owner is clearly acting in bad faith. Here are the details: http://www.icann.org/udrp/udrp-policy-24oct99.htm | ||
| Odie |
We are in the process of opening a pet supply store and throughout the process of getting the FID, State re-sale license, State biz license, and forming our LLC, etc. everyone said as long as there wasn't another company within the same STATE with the same name that we had rights to the name and could do biz under that name legally. Granted it is trademarked or anything, we just are DBA under that name legally. I am by no means an attorney but that is what we just went thru. Good luck! | ||
| Rex |
You can register your name, etc, in your state, especially if no else is using it. when we were trademarking our grocery chain, we were told that if someone in the past had used the name, and had it officially up on a building they had rights to it. there are national trademarks for the logos and names along with each state. we did a lot of research and then turned it over to the attorneys to take care of...making sure we were covered once the name and logos were picked. we had someone send american sportbike night a note saying that they would buy our site and name for $60 bucks. sounds like folks out there buying up names. I am sure certain names, like harley davidson, sears, etc. could fight these guys and win, if they were to own one of their names...rex | ||
| Espcustoms |
Unfortunately, you're probably screwed. The law keeps people from buying up domain names matching existing trademarks, but there's no law to keep a person from inventing new domain names and buying them. If you come along later and decide to name your business something that they already thought of, you're out of luck. I'm no lawyer, but do work in the website business and have run into this many times. Personally, I think you should have to maintain a relevant website in order to keep ownership of a domain name. In another 5 years, the only domain names left will be total jibberish or too long to be of any value. | ||
| Lowflyer |
Have you tried Icarus Air? | ||
| Skyguy |
Good one lowflier. I would if anything call it Dadaelius Air. Icarus was the ••••••• that flew to close to the sun and crashed. Most pilots avoid anything with Icarus in the name as a result.................... The stupid squatters are killing me I spent four hours online today looking and the best I could do was come up with "Cloud Bouncers". What do you guys think? | ||
| Lowflyer |
Sorry, I am reminded of a good friend of mine who started a helicopter business with the slogan, "The sky is not the limit; the ground is." No kidding!  I think you should work on an alternative domain name. | ||
| Smcnamara |
Here's the portion from the UDRP that appears pertinent: 4. Mandatory Administrative Proceeding. This Paragraph sets forth the type of disputes for which you are required to submit to a mandatory administrative proceeding. These proceedings will be conducted before one of the administrative-dispute-resolution service providers listed at www.icann.org/udrp/approved-providers.htm (each, a "Provider"). a. Applicable Disputes. You are required to submit to a mandatory administrative proceeding in the event that a third party (a "complainant") asserts to the applicable Provider, in compliance with the Rules of Procedure, that (i) your domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the complainant has rights; and (ii) you have no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name; and (iii) your domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith. In the administrative proceeding, the complainant must prove that each of these three elements are present. b. Evidence of Registration and Use in Bad Faith. For the purposes of Paragraph 4(a)(iii), the following circumstances, in particular but without limitation, if found by the Panel to be present, shall be evidence of the registration and use of a domain name in bad faith: (i) circumstances indicating that you have registered or you have acquired the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring the domain name registration to the complainant who is the owner of the trademark or service mark or to a competitor of that complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of your documented out-of-pocket costs directly related to the domain name; Of course, you would have to determine whether the cost of filing a legal compliant which would initiate the registrar beginning arbitration is worthwhile, but if you can deal with the up-front cost, I think the internet community in general would get behind you on this. Domain squatters suck. It's not the way it was supposed to work, but good technical engineers are often not really savvy about the business of greed. | ||
| Chellem |
I don't know how all that stuff can be the real guidelines. There are businesses whose entire business model is in violation of those policies. My family used to own a paper/website called Iron Biker News, the website was ironbiker.com. About 30 seconds after the domain registration lapsed, some company swooped it up, and now holds it, offering to resell it back to us, or to whoever. You can bid on the name if you go to the site now. It's clearly squatting. I mean, capitalism at work I guess, but this company does this for a living, so I'm surprised to see that there are regulations like this. You could, of course, name it what you want and then end it with .us or .tv or .cc or one of the new extensions they added a few years ago. But people won't by default type that in. Personally, I think it's kinda crappy of these companies to take advantage like this. But, as someone said, that's free market. People do crappy things sometimes. | ||
| Skyguy |
Maybe I need to hold a "Name that balloon company" contest............... I am to close to the forest sometimes. My head is bloody from bashing it against the wall. hours spent and still nothing..... | ||
| Captpete |
Skyguyballons dot com | ||
| Trac95ker |
I hope you will take skydivers up. They are a good source of income and they will help you pack up your balloon! It was a lot of fun jumping out of balloons? | ||
| Skyguy |
It is fun taking skydivers. I have only done it once but it takes a fair bit of skill to deal with the balloon getting very light, very fast. I hooked up with some folks from a base rig manufacturer in Auburn, Ca. They want to use the balloon to test jump their new rig. Skyguy balloons? Yuck. lol | ||
| Captpete |
Skyguy balloons? Yuck. In its defense, it was available.  May_West_Balloon_Co? Magic_Carpet.... Tims flying bags dot com. I bet that one hasn't been taken!  Hell, I'm trying to help you out here man.  The bag it balloon co dot com Sure your middle name isn't Bob? Bobs bags dot com. I like that one. Or just hotbags dot com Or if you're stuck on appollo, how 'bout appollohotbags dot com? All right, maybe I'm not helping. | ||
| Captpete |
Tim, I just used two different domain search sites and they both say that appolloair.com is available? http://whois.domaintools.com/appolloair.com http://www.domain-search-now.com/ | ||
| Captpete |
Ok, I got one too many p's in there, but maybe that's an option? | ||
| Smitty808 |
It's a pain! I have a personal site for my other hobby. I named it after my truck, and went with the cheapest domain I could find, wich was the .us (www.godzuki.us). I had a little guy from Japan contact me, to let me know that he would sell me the godzuki.com domain for only $500. I promptly told him where he could put that!! I go through http://www.godaddy.com to register my domains. The have an option there to reserve a name. You have to renew the names every year, and if they don't renew it soon enough, you can snag it out from under them. They also suggest other names when the one you have is taken, might help move the search along. | ||
| Skyguy |
Captpete your killing me lol. I nearly made the same mistake and almost started to register appollo air until I noticed that apollo has only one "P". Boy that would have been bad. Oh boy another day of tearing my hair out. | ||
| Pammy |
apolloskyride apolloairride (sounds like suspension though) That is assuming your business discription is offering rides in a balloon (in the sky) | ||
| Skyguy |
apolloairride lol, going to have to get some hydraulics for the balloon, maybe some of those chrome nekid ladies for the basket.................  | ||
| Oldog |
up up and away hot air baloons dot kom apollo does not compute for me, but it sounds cool | ||
| Panic |
the only domain names left will be total jibberish or too long to be of any value They'll just do what they already did: invent another suffix. When I first registered if you didn't qualify for .net, .org etc. (non-profit) .com was all you could get. Now, there are many, many more with the same name but new suffix, typically using the ID of some banana republic like Togo. | ||
| Lowflyer |
ApolloAirBiscuit.com is not taken. | ||
| Kandie |
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| Chainsaw |
Try throwing in a bit of another language like Latin or Greek. Doubt squatters are thinking of that. Aero Apollo Apollo Aero |
