Threatened to pay 1000 USD for a domain name. What are my options?



financialjesus said:
I own a .org domain name for a somewhat known product and have been asked to transfer the domain over to the .com domain holder and pay 1000 dollar penalty fee.

To describe my situation better you can imagine that I own the domain name pampers.org (just an example) and the domain of the company actually selling Pampers is of course pampers.com

My website has a few articles regarding Pampers and some Google Adsense ads. The site gets a few visitors (up to 30 per day) and makes a little money.

I have now been contacted by a law firm representing Pampers, and they are basically saying that I should transfer the domain over to Pampers and pay them compensation of 1000 USD.

They also ask me what my name is - they don't know it because I have Whois Protection for the website.

What should I do?

I will not pay the 1000 USD that is for sure.

My options:
- Do as they say (I won't do it since I will never pay the 1000 USD)
- Take the website down
- Sell the website to someone else? :D
- Do nothing

What do you think?
Click to expand...

Hand it over if they pay you 2k instead. I don't know much about trademark but assuming if you're not in the same business as them it may be a different story. Like if you're Apple Grocery store, Apple computer can't bitch and moan to have you change your name...but I could be wrong.
 
Hold on ...

Where are u located ?

if you are in US, then you need to buy some lubes as they can rape you

but if you are outside US , specially in 3rd world countries simply ignore their emails or send them to dick-roll web page for some lolz
 
AndreasP said:
finally I was waitin for someone to say it - @ -joe- Right on!.. Ok so we have come up against the lawyers for a few things. When you start being a bigger fish in a small pond then you will get this. My advice.

1. NEVER admit you have it. if you admit you will be liable.
2. Delete the domain from your control be it from the register or gift it to someone or just change the name to a junk yard dog.
3. Never write back, ever!.
4. Get a drink and dont worry about it.. its not worth the hassel.
Click to expand...

Just wanted to say that I pretty much followed your advice but I did it before reading your post :D

I have not written back to the law firm so they really have no way of knowing if I have received and read their email or not.

I have contacted my domain registrar to delete the domain - unfortunately Namecheap said they can only delete domains up to 72 hours after the registration.
Currently the domain is null-routed so it doesn't work.

The bad thing is however that the domain still belongs to me for quite a few months and the lawyers can contact me again if they truly want.

I have modified the Whois protection settings to change the public contact email once every day.

I am not sure if there is anything else I can do that would help.
If anyone has any ideas please let me know.
 
Googlehammer would like some extra traffic. In fact, it might not be out of the realm of possibilities to have babies dancing for pampers.org redirected visitors. Shoot me a PM if you do.
 
I'll take it off your hands.

I'm going to sell that shit on Flippa, and call it a day. They can't do shit, unless you provoke them, or they are really anal. Then, worst case scenario, it will be a witch hunt.

I won't email the person back though, You could put it up on Sedo, and ask for $1001, and reverse it on them. No one can make you give up your property without a fight.

But seriously, I'll be willing to take that domain off your hands, and run them through the ringer.
 
OP - create an account at Namecheap with fake Whois information and PUSH the domain to the new account. This will be an instant process rather than a transfer which can be delayed.
 
OP, why the fuck are you being difficult here?

You say the domain gets 30 visitors a day and makes chump change, so why do you want to keep it? Just give them the damn domain and move on to new projects. You're wasting precious time that you could be using to make some REAL money!
 
If you haven't responded yet transfer it to India. Change the page to something about a company in India. That's basically what the owners of winrar.com did after we told them about the dispute being filed by the owners of winrar.
 
I can see all the professional legal advice itt *rollseyes*

Unless they come at you with a legitimate subpoena, don't do shit. And watch out for this too, shady assholes forge subpoenas too.

If they are legit and bother going that far, all you have to do is transfer the domain to them at that point. The courts love it when you settle outside and not waste their time. Just play dumb and say, omg I never got a C&D or w/e and just say you don't want any hassle and will give them the domain.

A C&D letter could just be major BS. If they send you one, you may want to, anonymously, get in contact with the company they supposedly support and ask if this lawyer/law firm represents their company in any way. If they do, you can either puss out and transfer the domain then and there, or wait for a subpoena.
 
No, i think just giving it to them would be the easiest way to handle this. I mean i sure as hell would never pay the 1000, but I'd rather get out while the going is good if you know what i mean.
 
In situation like this which happen to me several times you should definitely hand over the domain.
 
LOL! I can't stop laughing at some of the comments! I agree that you should hand over the domain to them. If you could find a way to sell it, maybe... That way you'll profit from it too and you don't have to pay them $1000.
 
They want you pay a $1000 penalty? Fuck them, and just for that, I'd extort them. Greedy cunts.

Tell them $2500 for the domain, or you'll see them in court. It'll probably cost them at least $5k in legal fees in order to convince a judge to give them the domain, so there's a decent chance they'll just pay the $2500, and be done with it.

EDIT: Do a bit of research before requesting the $2500, and quote a bunch of previous court cases regarding IP rights, etc. Then in your reply, use shit like, "as witnessed in US vs. Mr Henry in June 2006", etc. Give them a headache while reading your reply, so they're more willing to just buy the domain from you.
 
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