Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Domain Names : Battle of the Bay

[Fremont Servers]

What do you think of a domain name with the word "Bay" and auction business?

Like BidBay.com and eBay.com. Do you think eBay.com is able to get BidBay.com not to use "Bay"?

[Franky]

I think it's just like "Soft" in the software industry.
Can Microsoft sue anyone who use "soft" as a part of their company names? I guess not!

[GordonH]

Hello
We had a custromer with Mexbay.com which has nothing to do with auctions threatened by Ebay for trademark infringement.
They now claim the rights to all domains with the word "bay" in the title.
We also have a customer with kalahari.org (a site about the kalahari desert) who was threatened by Kalahari.net (an ISP) for infringing their trademark, even though Kalahari.net is named after the desert that kalahari.org is about.

Its a mad world.

Gordon

[Scott]

I also have heard of others purchasing domains that have the "bay" addition only to get ebays legal at their doors. The folks at ebay are mighty protective of their ebay

[Pilgrim]

Originally posted by GordonH

We also have a customer with kalahari.org (a site about the kalahari desert) who was threatened by Kalahari.net (an ISP) for infringing their trademark, even though Kalahari.net is named after the desert that kalahari.org is about.

How can you trademark a desert?

[One Web]

I once heard of a host threatening everyone with the letter "c" before the word "host" on their domain.

[StarGhost]

eBay seems to have the distinct idea now that they own the word "bay". I think the microsoft example is a good one. I think that anyone using the world "ebay" in a domain name is just pushing their luck though. But then, there are exceptions to this rule. Take BidBay.com for instance. Assuming BidBay haden't copied eBay's design and their logo, and harrassed eBay's users, do you think eBay would have won their case? Using the word "bay" in a domain name for an auction site seems to be pushing it, but what is everyone's opinion on it. What if someone were to start a completely different auction site under something like "uBay.com"? Then there are even more extended circumstances, for instance, what about the domain name www.SecureBay.com .... technically this has the word "ebay" in it, but the only word you hear is Bay.

There is a thread like this over on harvard law forums at: http://h2o.law.harvard.edu/viewThread.do?postId=1271

[GordonH]

We actually do not permit customers to register domain names with ebay in them because I am sick of all the legal paperwork we get served with.

[StarGhost]

Originally posted by GordonH
We actually do not permit customers to register domain names with ebay in them because I am sick of all the legal paperwork we get served with.

What about with the word "bay"?

[GordonH]

we allow bay, just not when it has the letter e in front of it!

We used to get people registering things like ebaywatcher.com or ebaythisthatandtheother.com
It never failed to cause trouble.

Every time we get one of these legal documents I have to brief our lawyers and inform our insurers. Its far too much work.

We also ban the word "escrow" as in my experience this is always linked with some sort of fraud and is probably paid for with a stolen card.

I wrote a subruotine that takes banned words from an array so I can change the list quite easily. Its a very handy addition.

[StarGhost]

Does anyone else have any comments on this thread? Cmon, I brought it out of a 2 year retirement to hear opinions. I'm doing research on trademark laws and specifically ebay.

[Acroplex]

A couple of years back I took the easy way out and had a name deleted (ending in "bay") per eBay's request. $8 was not worth the hassle.

[StarGhost]

Originally posted by timechange.com
A couple of years back I took the easy way out and had a name deleted (ending in "bay") per eBay's request. $8 was not worth the hassle.

What if it was a more valuable name like EastBay.com or something. Where is the line drawn, and do you think eBay has the rights to demand every single name with the word "bay" in it as their own? More importantly... assume someone started up a site with the word "bay" in the domain name and used it as an auctions site. Do you think this is a shut and closed case for ebay to take it away from them? Obviously ebay thinks this, since they threatened to sue www.alternabay.com for using it in their auctions site (a gay and lesbian auction site, in the sanfrancisco bay area). Eventually they changed their name to www.alternabid.com because they didn't have enough money to fight in court. What do you think of that?

[Acroplex]

They don't have the rights to every name, obviously. Intimidation is the key in such cases. Most often, the notifications are automated e.g. they scan lists of newly registered domains for a substring. Lame, I know, but it seems to work.

[dmaven]

ebay is very litigious and they have a large number of lawyers on the payroll. It is not worth it choose another name