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Friday, May 25, 2012


Microsoft wins domain name case covering eight domains


Microsoft,the United States-based multinational computer technology corporation has recently won a domain name case against Patrick McAuliffe. The company submitted a complaint to the National Arbitration Forum,requesting eight domain names,wwwbing.com, wwbing.com,wwwwbing.com,bingf.com,b8ng.com,b9ng.com> ,binfg.com, and binhg.com to be transferred from the respondent to the complainant.
Bing is the current web search engine from Microsoft.Therefore,Microsoft has applied to register the "Bing" trademark in a number of jurisdictions in including United States and Trademark Office.
The complainant accuses Patrick McAuliffe for registering a confusingly similar to its trademark and,moreover,for registering and using the disputed domain names in bad faith.
On the other hand,the respondent gives some interesting answers in his defense.He sent a relatively short email to the National Arbitration Forum in which he explained that he was unaware of wwwbing.com being similar to complainant's trademark.
" Microsoft launched bing.com on 28th May 2009.  This was a full two months AFTER I registered wwwbing.com on on 26th march 2009. I was at that time unaware of wwwbing.com being similar to the search engine bing.com.
I am using the domain wwwbing.com to promote a children's book called "Walter Will Wawrinka Bing". It involves a troll who has supernatural and magical powers in modern Scandinavia. It will be published on the 5th April 2010 in Ireland. I have every right to register a domain name to promote a book.",said Patrick McAuliffe in his response.
Moreover,he explained in the e-mail that he never sent an e-mail to Bill Gates offering him to sell the wwwbing.com  domain name .
However,Microsoft provided evidence that the respondent wanted to sell the domain name to the complainant.
Because Microsoft managed to demonstrate all the elements needed,the Panel ordered that the domain names be transferred from the respondent to the complainant.

You can see the decision here .

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