Hi Chris
The word "cybersquatting" was in a quote from Ross Wm. Rader, the Director
Product Management, Channel Platform Group, Tucows Inc. He can be said to
represent the views of the registrar, OpenSRS. As such he is reasonably
authoritative.
However, Ross in turn was quoting the official views of ICANN when he said:
>> They [ICANN] have officially stated for the record that they will under
>> no circumstances accredit a firm that actively engages in, or knowingly
>> facilitates cybersquatting. Further, they denied accreditation to
>> AfterNIC on this basis.
That statement is carefully worded to suggest that Ross is not alleging that
Afternic is a "cybersquatter". Furthermore, Ross is not even saying that
ICANN accused Afternic of being a cybersquatter (tho' you may imply it)..
Simply that "they denied accreditation on that basis".
Which as we know led to a court case and a deal with register.com.
But as a holder of a number of domain names myself, I do agree with your
implication that selling a domain at a profit is often labelled as
"cybersquatting" by default rather than a commercial exchange governed by
the same laws as any other commercial exchange
Furthermore, I agree with you when you say that the term 'cybersquatter' is
frequently misused and defined incorrectly, thus leaving those in this
community, and the internet community as whole, with a bad taste in their
mouth whenever 'domain selling' is mentioned.
That was particularly evident in a private posting on estamps.com where I
wrote:
I am personally satisfied that if someone comes along and registers:
things-go-better-with-coca-cola.com
they are directly infringing the proprietary rights of Coca Cola (both
copyright and trade mark rights). But if somebody registers e-oven.com,
e-TV.com or e-stamps.com, they are merely adapting an old idea to a new
medium.
In that case I do not know the facts (causing me to remark "interesting" and
wait for further comment) but on the face of it it very much looks to me as
if Dave Lahoti was entitled to the domain name on the:
(a) first-come, first-served basis and
(b) no obvious breach of their proprietary rights
Which, I might add, were doubtful and not well-established in the first
place.
At least I had not heard of them.
Regards
Patrick Corliss
