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[wg-b] computer freedom and privacy conference
"David Post of Temple Law School
panned the controversial anti-cybersquatting legislation and raised questions
about how the courts and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN) are dealing with disputes regarding who has the right to certain domain
names.
Under some laws and ICANN's dispute
resolution policy, people can't register names in 'bad faith,' a term that has
yet to be defined, Post said. One person in the audience asked if a parody site
could be considered a site registered in 'bad faith.'
The answer from the panel: We don't
know. "
________________
They don't know? Well, how about an educated guess?
If the udrp came down on the side of a trademark owner in a
parody case it would be violating well documented First Amendment protections in
the U.S. It would be challenged. The decision would be overturned in court, the
trademark owner would lose and people would become reluctant to use the UDRP
because it had no authority.
"In bad faith" just like "fame" is subjective.
Words and phrases that cannot be defined with some degree of universality should
be avoided where possible in created the rules and regulations surrounding the
dns. But as long as we're using human language, not zeroes and ones, it isn't
always possible.