OneIowa.org is the homepage for LGBT equality advocates there. The just-launched OneIowa.com, however, is the homepage for Iowans United, which is reportedly just a front for Iowa Family Policy Center, the anti-same-sex marriage group. Certainly a case for trademark violations here. [via]
tricksters
The Difference Between OneIowa.org and OneIowa.com
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Mike L.
Yeah it appears that opponents of cuases have been using similar online names of their enemies (the public’s friends) with just a few diferences in hopes that ppl type in the wrong address to land them w them and missinform them.
Not new, Rachel Maddow just this week did a segment on this, but about other organizations’ websites.
The enemy is a tricky SOB, and here we thought they were xtians, rather they are evil coniving lying decieving homophobic cheats who mascarade as xtians.
alex
This ia a non-story. Anyone that know anything about the Internet knows that .com and .org aren’t the same thing.
Guess what? queerty.info, queerty.net, queerty.us., queerty.biz, queerty.me, and queerty.me are all available. vailable for purchase. What’s stopping a homophobic group/company from buying that domain?
alex
Got cut off. Any company/organization knows they should buy all the available domains. I can buy queerty.info for $0.89/year from GoDaddy. If I started a gay blog at that URL, there’s no way queerty.com could sue me for “trademark violation.”
Aaron Rowland
It’s rare, but it’s happened before. Corporations and celebrities have successfully sued to claim occupied domain names. I think they just have to prove infringement and that the person has no legitimate claim to the domain (i.e. the famous Tom Cruise couldn’t sue a non-famous Tom Cruise if that person was sitting on the domain).
Way too much work for something stupid, though. Is Queerty even a registered trademark?
Andrew
I like how the entire family on that .com site look like they’re from the 80’s.
Andy
@alex: Actually you can sue and there’s other processes outside of court you can pursue. You can’t buy all the extensions because there’s so many of them, practically speaking.
However, the point though is that oneiowa.com was registered AFTER oneiowa.org. So it seem the tech team should have spent the $10 to register the .com to prevent this. Buying the .com when you have the .org is just common sense.
NVLawMan
@alex: Yeah, sorry Alex, but the tort law and trademark law tell us otherwise. If they can meet the elements of the prima facie case, which I am confident they reasonably could, they can file a claim and probably win it, even if it is just an injunction to stop the opposing site. Don’t forget that this is also a political campaign which deals with the rights of citizens which the Iowa Supreme Court clearly stated are constitutionally protected. An Iowa trial court judge is not necessarily going to look kindly upon the opposition in such a case attempting to employ fraudulent misrepresentation in their campaign. Actually, from a legal standpoint they should definitely be against such a tactic as a matter at law (although the jurist’s personal biases are apt to influence the decision of the bench in such a case, illegal, unethical, but true).
Wade MacMorrighan
Yes, .org and .com are different “things”, however, I have often typed them in quite accidentally and been dumb-founded by what I saw; some of it was, in fact, masquerading as other data that was severely misinforming! Personally, as an Iowa, I *do* hope that One-Iowa gets this site revoked; hell, many people actually buy ALL possible domain alternatives as a safe-guard.
Wade MacMorrighan
“We have the right to vote on marriage”?!?!?! Really “Iowa United”??? Just like you have the so-called “right” to vote on segregation, slavery, and civil rights, too (each of which Americans demanded in turn!)… Anyone know how to e-mail, these bozos (no offense to my favorite clown, of course!)?
uhm
@alex: yeah but don’t cause godaddy is in Arizona.