Colin’s, a Turkish fashion firm, launched a UDRP against the owner of Colins.com – a domain registered years ago by the father of a guy named Colin.
Now a student, the Respondent’s domain was kept for future use, until he were older.
For the record, Colins.com was registered in 1997, several years before the Complainant’s mark came to existence.
The Complainant’s web site is Colins.com.tr.
Google image results for “Colins”.
The Respondent’s defense stated:
“The Respondent has a son named Colin Messinger. The Respondent registered the Disputed Domain with the intention that his son would use it when he was older.
The Respondent’s son now uses the email address associated with the Disputed Domain Name (“[…]@colins.com”) as his primary email address. The Respondent’s son also uses the Disputed Domain Name for personal and educational communication and research purposes. He does this via intranet administrative pages that are accessible via password.
The Complainant registered the Trade Mark in the USA on September 27, 2005, which was a number of years after the Respondent registered the Disputed Domain Name.
The Respondent is making a legitimate noncommercial or fair use of the Disputed Domain Name, without intent for commercial gain misleadingly to divert consumers or to tarnish the Trade Mark. The website at the Disputed Domain Name specifically states that its current purpose is for personal use and education, and has never referred to the Complainant, its competitors, or the industry in which the Complainant operates.”
John Swinson, sole panelist, saw through the attempt of the Complainant, Erk Pazarlama ve Giyim San. Ve Tic. A.Ş. of Istanbul, Turkey to grab the domain, and denied the transfer of Colins.com.
For the full text of this UDRP decision click here.
I am Jake Messinger, the registrar and the father of Colin Messinger, the one who registered this domain name 20 years ago, for my son’s personal use. I also have colins.net and colins.org.
This Turkish company has tried clandestinely several times to trick me into transferring or selling the domain name to them for free or a very low price. The one time that they overtly contacted me, they made a low ball offer of 5k. I told them it was for my son and I would not consider selling it for less than $50,000 because I didn’t really want to sell it.. They balked at that price and said it was unfair and I was trying to make money off of them. This is a 4 Billion dollar a year company according to their own website. That is when I got hit with the UDRP and letters from attorneys threatening legal action. They misrepresented themselves and listed falsehoods in their pleadings. They lost, of course. I’m sure they paid their agents and attorney’s more than $50k to try to wrangle it away from me at this point. If they had just dealt with my up front and in an honest way, i may have let them have the domain name. To this day, they have yet to recontact me after the UDRP ruling.