[wg-b] What WG-B is supposed to be doing (RE: Arbitration)

[Harald Tveit Alvestrand <Harald@alvestrand.no>]

I've changed the subject line again, since you didn't reply to my comments 
on arbitration.

At 15:49 23.09.99 -0400, DEUTSCH, SARAH B. wrote:
>
>I thought we were supposed to working on protecting famous marks in this
>working group.

IMHO, no. We're working on defining how ICANN will interact with the laws 
about famous marks. The difference is significant.

>   The proactive exclusion can and will work.  I believe that a
>qualified expert group of decisionmakers, using the WIPO standards, can 
>come up with a list of famous marks.  There should be no overall cap -- 
>because famous marks are always in the making.  The proactive exclusion 
>would apply to the exact mark or extremely close variations (e.g., 
>BellAtlantic.firm, Bell-Atlantic.firm) and would afford the trademark 
>owner the right to secure its essential, famous name in the new gTLD space.

Quick, now: Is "kodiak" an extremely close variation of "kodak"? How about 
"Kvarner" and "Kvaerner"? "Porse" and "Porsche"?
We went through this about 2 weeks ago; did you look at the archives?

>  Otherwise, what you are arguing is that "entrepreneurs" should have the 
> right to confuse customers and engage in consumer fraud by stealing exact 
> duplications of famous marks in the new name spaces.

The opposite argument is that you are refusing to have the Nike Rocket 
Corps Veterans be allowed to use nike.veteran because of a shoe maker.

>  There already appear to be plenty of "business opportunities" for 
> "entrepreneurs" who steal variations of famous marks at their own peril. 
> Bell Atlantic submitted documented evidence of the more than 1000 domain 
> name infringements we experienced for two of our marks in .com, .net and .org.

Do you have this online? URL?

(At the WIPO process, a similar list for "nissan" was passed around - some 
were clearly intended to confuse; others (like "tennissandiego") were good 
for a laugh. Of the list that included registrant details, about 2/3 seemed 
to be registered by various Nissan dealers; about 1/3 seemed to be 
registered by irrelevant bodies, possibly cybersquatters. I've been 
reluctant to accept numbers presented without the supporting evidence ever 
since.
I'm sure you are correct that you have problems - but I like seeing the data.)

                        Harald

--
Harald Tveit Alvestrand, Maxware, Norway
Harald.Alvestrand@maxware.no