Re: [ga] Domain names as observed (was Tucows Response to Cochet tiTransfer Letter)

["William S. Lovell" <wsl@cerebalaw.com>]

L Gallegos wrote:

Joop, may I say once again that there are no "property" rights in a
domain name itself.  Rights in the use of the name are conferred
by the registrar/registrant agreement and that is where a registrant
should look prior to registering the domain.  However, just because
a domain name is not property, per se, it does not mean that there
are no rights in it.  Again, those rights are determined by the
registration agreement and can differ from registry to registry.

Leah

I would have to disagree with this entirely.  To say that "rights
in the
use of the name are conferred by the registrar/registrant agreement"
would imply that the registrar had rights to confer, which it does
not.
Rights to the use of the registrar's facilities are what are
conferred by
that agreement, without regard to the domain name itself which, if
created ("conceived," "invented," etc.) by the registrant, could only
be the intellectual property of that registrant.   I realize,
of course,
that these agreements say otherwise, but it is fundamental to the
law that one cannot convey what one does not own, so any portion
of any document that pretends to say otherwise would be null and
void on its face.  Too bad no one has the wherewithal (or the
***)
to prove that.

IAAL; this is not legal advice but a scholarly observation.

Bill Lovell
 

 

On 29 Jul 2001, at 0:30, Joop Teernstra wrote:

> At 22:37 27/07/2001 -0400, L Gallegos wrote:
> >   Registrants, IMO, should be able to feel
> >secure in the use of a registered domain.
>
> I am glad to hear you say that. :-)
> As far as is legally proper, in the interest of the Domain Holders but
> also of the stability of the DNS, they should *be* secure. Any
> argument that Domain Names are not the registrant's property, to
> dispose or transfer as the registrant sees fit, serves to destabilize
> the DNS.
>
>

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