Announcing “La La Land” as the best movie during tonight’s Academy Awards was a mistake; the snafu was quickly discovered, leading to “Moonlight” winning best picture.
The incident sent waves among those watching the 89th Academy Awards, and it became viral very quickly.
Borrowing elements from the current political arena and references to “fake news,” the hashtag #FakeOscars is being used to referencing the wrong announcement.
Someone went as far as to register the domain FakeOscars.com, which is not going to sit well with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which is very protective of its trademarks.
There are 7 UDRPs filed against such infringing domains over the years, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has won them all, in particular:
- porno-oscar.com in 2003
- oscartv.com in 2003
- academyawards.net in 2005
- ampas.com in 2005
Registering such domains might seem like a fun, innocent thing to do, but we’d expect that in the case of FakeOscars.com the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences would move in swiftly.
