IP attorney, John Berryhill, shared news of the domains 007.Bond and James.Bond up for sale on Sedo.
The obvious trademark violations were advertised via a banner at NamePros, with links to the Sedo auction for James.Bond.
Said John Berryhill in a post titled “Abject Stupidity:”
So, some idiot paid $800 for this domain name, made a custom banner to advertise it in specific association with the movie franchise, and thinks someone is going to pay $100k for it?
If this is something that strikes you as a good idea then, please, get out of domaining immediately.
The world-famous trademarks for 007 and James Bond are managed by Danjaq LLC – the holding company responsible for the copyright and trademarks to the characters, elements, and other material related to James Bond on screen. It is currently owned and managed by the family of Albert R. Broccoli, the co-initiator of the popular film franchise.
Dot .Bond domains cost roughly $800 dollars to register and renew, but it’s not clear if these are indeed domains registered by an investor. Some NamePros members noted that the outbound link when clicking the banner included the word “ShortDot” which is the dot .Bond registry.
The ensuing argument about the legitimacy of such registrations and their auction became quite tense. Today, the ad banner has been pulled from NamePros but the domains are still listed for sale at Sedo, for $100,000 dollars each.
Reading through that topic reminds me why I don’t post there anymore. It is quite obvious it’s a highly defended trademark. The fact that so many people will argue against that boggles the senses. I have to say there are a couple of valid points in the topic, the one I think is fair to ask is…. Why would namepros accept advertising from an obvious trademark infringement? As much as I love to read JB’s posts I would be very interested in his view of the legalities for namepros. Could they somehow be dragged into a legal dispute between the mark owners and the owner of the domains.