|
 |  | |
|
|
about Asia Buzz
Asia Buzz: Domain Envy
Who owns what in cyberspace?
By ERIC ELLIS
September
5, 2000
Web posted at 3:30 p.m. Hong Kong time, 3:30 a.m. EDT
I got an arrogant e-mail the other day from a guy called Steve Holstein
in Illinois. He had tracked down, via Register.com,
the owner of the Web domain Newsattack.com,
which happened to be me. I'd registered it a year ago because it was
a cool name that could be well adapted to some type of hip content
business.
|
INTERACTIVE |
|
Ticked off at Asia Buzz? Turned on? Talk back to
TIME
|
|
Steve told me he ran an e-zine [online magazine] called News Attack and was trademarking the name with the United States Patents Office. He wanted my address, and this is how he asked me: "The domain in your possession (newsattack.com) will be recognized as ours. I would like to bypass any legal intricacies and offer you payment in exchange for transferring the name NewsAttack.com into my name. I'm willing to pay your domain registration/parking fees plus an additional $100. I look forward to your reply."
| |
ASIA BUZZ |
|
Culture on Demand: WAP? Whatever
Head straight to third-generation technology. The results will be worth it.
-
Saturday, September 2, 2000
Letter
from Japan: Whale of a Problem
The world's dumbest government should be harpooned
-
Friday, September 1, 2000
Asia
Buzz: Orwellian Delights
Big Brother is watching you
-
Thursday, August 31, 2000
Asia
Buzz: Reality Bites
When Li Peng gets invited to the U.S. over the Dalai
Lama, there's something wrong
-
Wednesday, August 30, 2000
Asia
Buzz: You've Got Mail
Making a mistake in today's business world could cost
you your business
-
Tuesday, August 29, 2000
Culture
on Demand: From Dawn to Dusk
Beijing likes a public spectacle
-
Saturday, August 26, 2000
|
|
ASIAWEEK |
Intelligence
The story behind today's news from the editors of Asiaweek
|
|
I received this e-mail the day after I read that Hong Kong's Richard
Li had paid someone in the U.S. $1 million for the domain name Cyberworks.com
-- Pacificcentury.com
being an unobtainable mail-order bride site from Kansas City. Hmmm,
methinks, Li pays $1 million while I get offered the $70 registration
fee plus a C-note for my goodwill. And then I thought, who is this
guy anyway, why should I be the one that kowtows to his wishes? So
this is how I replied: "Thank you for your mail. I am a journalist
who is similarly developing a business called Newsattack, which is
precisely the reason why I registered the domain more than a year
ago. Last time I looked, the U.S. Patent office had jurisdiction within
the U.S. That's 4% of the global population. I wish you all the best
in getting as much of that 4% as your readership as you possibly can."
Glib? Perhaps, but it raises an interesting point about who owns what in cyberspace, and how the law deals with it. Should U.S. law be any more authoritative than, say, Bhutanese? If Holstein follows through, wins his case, and seizes control of my domain, why should I acknowledge its jurisdiction? Maybe if I do develop newsattack, do I input some program that prevents it from being loaded on American devices?
Madonna is getting a taste of it at the moment. Her lawyers brought
a case against a California pornographer who owns the Madonna.com
site. You can go to the site and read all about it (for any Singaporean
government officials reading, fear not, the porn has gone so there's
no need to prevent access). Madonna means much more to Catholics,
for example, than a singer that changes her image every couple of
years so as to make more money. Likewise, with Sting.com.
When we think of that word, do we think of a bee, or a wasp? Or do
we think of the former lead singer of the band, The Police, who's
now a solo artist with a strong interest in the Internet.
So far, in the U.S. at least, the law seems to be going the way of
Big Business. Around 75% of cases brought have gone the way of the
complainant. The World Intellectual Property Organization made an
American relinquish the address Tonsil.com to a German company that
had trademarked a bleach called Tonsil back in the 1950s. Go to Jesus.com,
or Jesuschrist.com,
and see what's happening there. Does the Church, any church that recognizes
Christ as the savior, have some special right to those domains, one
of which seems to be to be a satire that some might consider sacrilegious?
There are plenty of Hispanics called Jesus -- couldn't they bring an
action as well? And anybody who says religion is not a moneymaking
venture is naive in the extreme.
For my part, I'll sit on Newsattack for the minute. I registered a year ago, long before Steve Holstein thought to do so, and the words are generic enough to be inoffensive, dynamic enough to be a groovy corporate name. But if Steve wants to offer me something with a few more zeros than $100, then I might reconsider.
Eric Ellis is the Southeast Asia and Technology Editor of the regional
finance portal AsiaWise.com
Ticked off at Asia Buzz? Turned on? Talk back to
TIME
Write
to TIME at mail@web.timeasia.com
Search
for recent
Asia Buzz
TIME Asia home
|
|
LATEST HEADLINES:
|
Click Here for the latest regional analysis from TIME Asia
|
|
|
