Ivan, real data is always very valuable in any discussion -- I would
be interested to know a bit more about your recent experience in this
area.
But to continue the example just a bit: If the company looks
threatening, the correct strategy for the speculator is to capitulate
immediately, and transfers the domain at cost. Cost to the company:
huge (because even filing court papers to initiate action costs
money); cost to the speculator: nothing. Legal action on the part of
the company is a minor threat, if the speculator is clever. A
speculator who allows the case to get to court is stupid.
One of the caveats I was going to make in my above example is that
very large companies have legal expertise on staff, and it is much
more likely that they will indeed pursue legal action. Also, the
nature of the name matters: Pepsico, I think, would be quite likely to
squash any attempt at use of the name "pepsi" -- "pepsi" is a very
strong trademark. But United Airlines might be very much less
inclined to take action against a pirate who claimed "united.firm".
In that case, the pirate could pedal the name to United Airlines,
United Van Lines, and many other companies.
But it seems to me that the companies that are really vulnerable to
this kind of action are small companies with good trademarks.
-- Kent Crispin "No reason to get excited", kent@songbird.com the thief he kindly spoke... PGP fingerprint: B1 8B 72 ED 55 21 5E 44 61 F4 58 0F 72 10 65 55 http://songbird.com/kent/pgp_key.html