Bill Lovell wrote:
>>The answer to all this, again, would seem to be international
>>harmonization of trademark law through treaty, and perhaps the
>>institution of an international Internet court to decide such matters,
>>perhaps as an appellate court in case the parties in a national
>>court were dissatisfied. Even in the national courts, there are
>>problems of jurisdiction (many current domain name cases have
>>had to fight out whether or not the court in U. S. state A has
>>personal jurisdiction over a party that resides in state B) and
>>venue (even with jurisdiction, where is the thing to be tried?).
The world has been working on international harmonization of IP law since
the Paris Convention of 1883 (see "International Coordination", pages 274 -
291 of The Domain Name Handbook). At this rate, none of us on this list
are likely to see resolution in the jurisdictional issues of the domain
name arena during our lifetimes.
So I pose a question: Cross-border disputes are not new to commerce. How
have jurisdictional issues been handled in the past? Which country's rules
prevail when they are not in accord and the outcome would differ greatly
from one country to the next. Is it merely dependent upon which party is
the first to bring a dispute to litigation? Can a cross border dispute be
appealed by the losing party in a different, but appropriate, jurisdiction?
Isn't there a legal, historical jurisdictional record to which we can
turn?
Ellen Rony Co-author
The Domain Name Handbook http://www.domainhandbook.com
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