IP: Letters to the editor of the Economist re domain name story

[Dave Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

Letters to The Economist, July 13, 1996
  
[reprinted with permission]


You name it


SIR - In your June 8th article on internet domain names ("Names writ in
water") you neglect the main point.  Trademarks are registered in a system
that permits many companies to share a name legitimately without interfering
with each other, such as Sun Photo, Sun Oil and Sun Microsystems.  Domain
names only permit one user of a name; there is only one sun.com, which Sun
Microsystems registered first.  Neither lawyers nor governments can make ten
pounds of names fit into a one-pound bag.


Like trademarks, Internet names have traditionally been assigned first come,
first served.  Users of these names must be permitted to use any unassigned
name unless they use it in a way that actually infringes on a trademark.  If
roadrunner.com sells cartoons or Acme Anvils, it is in trouble;  if it sells
computers, Warner Brothers has no legitimate complaint.  Network Solutions
Incorporated (NS) has shown itself poor at adjudicating such complaints.
That is a job for the courts, which have procedural protections for the
innocent as well as proper punishments for the guilty.


JOHN GILMORE
Electronic Frontier Foundation




SIR-You state incorrectly that under NSI policy a trademark certificate is
enough to protect a domain name if challenged.  In fact, a domain-name owner
also must sign, in effect, a blank cheque to pay all the money NSI might
choose to spend on lawyers.  I am aware of at one other domain name owner
who lost his domain name (despite having a trademark certificate) through
unwillingness to make that commitment.


CARL OPPEDAHL
New York

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