The response made it clear it would not win its case.
The group that owns the the French wine estate Chateau Ausone filed a UDRP against the owner of Ausone.com.
On the face of it, I can understand why they filed the complaint. At the time they filed, visitors to Ausone.com saw a parked page that included links to wine. If they looked at the whois for Ausone.com, it didn’t indicate any connection to an “Ausone” brand”, other than the registrant being located in AUStralia.
But once the respondent replied to the case, it became clear that Chateau Ausone would not win.
The response made it absolutely clear that the domain name wasn’t registered in bad faith. The registrant is an Australian property developer that names many of its buildings with ONE at the end, e.g. SouthbankONE and MelbourneONE. It registered the business name for “Australia One Apartments” for an upcoming project back in 2009, along with the domain name ausone.com.au. It acquired Ausone.com earlier this year for $7,000 at Sedo.
Chateau Ausone could have figured some of this out had it done some research. However, on the face of it, it looked like typical cybersquatting.
But once the response was received, was it fair that Chateau Ausone continued with its case? It’s a tough question.
Had Chateau Ausone doubled down and made a supplemental filing, I think that would put the case in reverse domain name hijacking territory. Leaving the original case in the hands of a UDRP panelist might be an acceptable course of action in this case.
What do you think?
Leave a Comment