Hello JP and Adam We have actually been getting the usual form letter for two domains we had registered recently, replied to them, explained, and that was that. The domains I am referring to are: e-golddinar.com and egolddinar.com
There are two main distinctions between the two above and e-gold-casino.com, though. As JP points out, latter has actually the name 'e-gold' in it, and I would think that to be indeed an infringement. More so as the message that White Bear posted actualy quotes 'Egold Casino'. The difference between the casino and our two domains is this: We registered the two names as 'Electronic Golddinar', NOT as 'eGold Dinar'. This fine nuance, makes all the difference. After all, as I explained in my reply to the e-mail from e-gold at the time, E-gold Ltd. can not possibly claim the trademark on a currency that what widely in use some 600 years before Columbus (re-)discovered America. Adding the 'e-/e' in front is a widely used practice that signifies the electronic version of a real life article or service. Hence e-golddinar.com can not possibly infringe on the e-gold trademark. Of course, in our case, there is also to consider that we are building an information site about the electronic version of the Golddinar system as it is being developed and promoted by the Malaysian government. That in itself, should make a lot of difference. To sum up, rather than looking at the words used in the domain three other tests need to be applied to establish if an infringement indeed takes place: (1) Does the domain name include the actual trademark or parts thereof and does the operator engage in a related field? (ie. e-gold-seller.com infringes, egoldcardonline.com doesn't - if it stands for Electronic GoldCard Online and neither is, nor accepts DGC) (2) Does the domain name that includes all or parts of the trademark, capitalize on the trademark? (in the sense of promoting something that will benefit from the use of the trademark, such as e-goldseller.com) (3) Are the motives of the registrant of a domain name such, that he wants to benefit from the fact that e-gold.com is well known in certain circles and is there evidence that the registrant acted in bad faith? Looking at the above, I would say e-gold-casino.com does indeed infringe in the first two instances, while e-golddinar.com doesn't at all. I personally dislike the thinking of 'anything goes unless litigation proves otherwise'. On the other hand, there need to be limits to what one can claim and I think that the three tests above should be used - in addition to common sense - to establish if an infringement is taking place or not. And if a site that has e-gold in the domain name but has nothing to do with DGC and the domain name actually means 'electronic gold-something' then that can not possibly seen as an infringement on the e-gold trademark, or? Cheers, Robert. PS - just imagine the Austrians would claim prior art on the word 'Dollar' because it is derived from the word 'Taler' and would then proceed to trademark it and force other countries to rename their currencies... budget & privacy website hosting http://www.cyberica.net budget & privacy domain registrations + mail http://www.u2planet.com/cfdomaintrust.html --- You are currently subscribed to e-gold-list as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Use e-gold's Secure Randomized Keyboard (SRK) when accessing your e-gold account(s) via the web and shopping cart interfaces to help thwart keystroke loggers and common viruses.
