Swedish Company Demands Control Of My Domain
- Thread starter 1yerrot
- Start date
Update...
Here is my reply letter to the agency that contacted me. To be clear these domains probably only make me about $70 and I didnt spend more than $100 on either when building them up and linking them, so I'm not stressing about losing them, I really want to see how this turns out though. I sent this reply 5 days ago, but they haven't responded yet. ----------------------------------------------------------------
Hello *******, Thank you for your tact and respectful correspondence. I apologize for any trouble I may have brought the ************ company, it certainly wasn't my intention as I think the company makes a great product. I would like you to know that I didn't ignore the first demand, I simply didn't receive it because I now live overseas. I talked to many people about my options in this case and the writing is on the wall that I would probably lose my domain if you filed a UDRP I would likely lose my domain to your client. I talked to many people who have been in this situation and have dealt with it in different ways. During my talks with people about this, I received an offer to buy the domains from me. I also own the .net for the name. Because I have put money and work into these domains, I rather sell the domains to my buyer and recoup some of my investment rather than simply turn them over to you for nothing. This is nothing personal, this is business. I am aware of the cost of filing UDRP and I'd rather have the domain in the hands of either your client or myself ofcourse. With that being the case, if your client is willing to match the $900 U.S. I will transfer the 2 domains to your client immediately. If not, which is understandable, I will sell to the best offer I have received. I hope that is also understandable to you and your client. If you wish to proceed, we can go through www.escrow.com for the immediate transaction. I will look to hear your response before taking any action. Have a good day Ma'am. Mr. *******
Here is my reply letter to the agency that contacted me. To be clear these domains probably only make me about $70 and I didnt spend more than $100 on either when building them up and linking them, so I'm not stressing about losing them, I really want to see how this turns out though. I sent this reply 5 days ago, but they haven't responded yet. ----------------------------------------------------------------
Hello *******, Thank you for your tact and respectful correspondence. I apologize for any trouble I may have brought the ************ company, it certainly wasn't my intention as I think the company makes a great product. I would like you to know that I didn't ignore the first demand, I simply didn't receive it because I now live overseas. I talked to many people about my options in this case and the writing is on the wall that I would probably lose my domain if you filed a UDRP I would likely lose my domain to your client. I talked to many people who have been in this situation and have dealt with it in different ways. During my talks with people about this, I received an offer to buy the domains from me. I also own the .net for the name. Because I have put money and work into these domains, I rather sell the domains to my buyer and recoup some of my investment rather than simply turn them over to you for nothing. This is nothing personal, this is business. I am aware of the cost of filing UDRP and I'd rather have the domain in the hands of either your client or myself ofcourse. With that being the case, if your client is willing to match the $900 U.S. I will transfer the 2 domains to your client immediately. If not, which is understandable, I will sell to the best offer I have received. I hope that is also understandable to you and your client. If you wish to proceed, we can go through www.escrow.com for the immediate transaction. I will look to hear your response before taking any action. Have a good day Ma'am. Mr. *******
UPDATE
It's been interesting, lol....
So After I told them I would sell them the two domains for $900 about 3 weeks ago they sent a formal response saying that they do not have the custom of buying the domain names from "cybersquatters" but they would offer me the cost of what they deem I paid to build the sites.
They offered me $100 for the two sites. I then counter offered for $500 for the two or just go ahead and file while I sell the sites to someone else. They disappeared for about a week and then popped up with this email....
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Dear Mr. xxxxxxx
Thank you for your email.
Please know that the client has rejected your offer of $500. Although you keep referring to this matter as mere “business”, your unauthorized registration and use of our client’s protected mark in the domain names is nevertheless “cybersquatting”. In addition to losing the domain names, you may be held liable for statutory damages.
We have been asked to inform you that our client’s offer of $100 for the IMMEDIATE transfer of the domain names remains open until end of business day on Thursday May 12th. If you do not accept the offer, we have been instructed to initiate formal proceedings against you.
Sincerely,
xxxxxxxxxx
I sent back a reply that said "thank you for your time." Thats it.
So now I wait again, lol.... Any thoughts, should I take the hundred and bail?
It's been interesting, lol....
So After I told them I would sell them the two domains for $900 about 3 weeks ago they sent a formal response saying that they do not have the custom of buying the domain names from "cybersquatters" but they would offer me the cost of what they deem I paid to build the sites.
They offered me $100 for the two sites. I then counter offered for $500 for the two or just go ahead and file while I sell the sites to someone else. They disappeared for about a week and then popped up with this email....
[FONT="]
[/FONT]
Dear Mr. xxxxxxx
Thank you for your email.
Please know that the client has rejected your offer of $500. Although you keep referring to this matter as mere “business”, your unauthorized registration and use of our client’s protected mark in the domain names is nevertheless “cybersquatting”. In addition to losing the domain names, you may be held liable for statutory damages.
We have been asked to inform you that our client’s offer of $100 for the IMMEDIATE transfer of the domain names remains open until end of business day on Thursday May 12th. If you do not accept the offer, we have been instructed to initiate formal proceedings against you.
Sincerely,
xxxxxxxxxx
I sent back a reply that said "thank you for your time." Thats it.
So now I wait again, lol.... Any thoughts, should I take the hundred and bail?
Well, I know my opinion means nothing to you, but I am in a sharing mood and have nothing else to do at the moment...
Have you really gained anything here by spending time on this? I mean, sure, it's BS that they want to take the domains, and while there is a place and time to take a stand and act based on your principles, this doesn't really seem to be worth it.
Even if you are right, who cares? Karma can be a bitch, and what goes around usually comes around, or something like that...
If I were in your position, I would just take the cash, buy a pizza and give the delivery man a huge tip...
Then make a thread about it...
Between writing about it on here and sending reply emails, the time has totaled about 20 mins bro. That's not a concern. At all.
Because it doesn't matter, if they file it I lose it.
If they file they will win regardless of the email and I am not gonna die if I lose the domains(they're basically throwaway sites), I am angling for a decent payoff, not to keep the domains.
I am being realistic with them admitting that point to give validity to the fact that I also know realistically what it cost to file and I KNOW that they will be spending a lot more than what I'm asking. Nahmean?
You got WAY too wordy with your reply, lol. At this point I would just sit tight. Don't do anything and wait and see what they do.
Dude, they are negotiating with me. The words worked, now I'm just trying see for how much money they have worked.
I am layin low now though, that's all I've basically done anyway after I shot of an email. Believe me, when I'm not in the act of reading an email from them or replying about it, I ain't thinking bout them. This isn't a stress on me, the domains make a few bucks but like I said they are throwaways. If they had contacted me about a big money site, I would have probably have contacted a lawyer.
But with this, I'm almost treating it like a case study.
That doesn't look like much of a negotiation from what I've read. Good luck though.
Interesting thread, i'm pretty much in exactly the same boat as OP.
I received an email from lawyers demanding i transfer my domain name to them immediately, and that i remove all copyrighted images from my site.
Funny thing is, the 'copyrighted images' are the ones that shopperpress pulls in from Amazon, it's an amazon affiliate site.
My domain name is a .org and consists of a combination similar to something like this, where xxxxx is the companies name/trademark:
xxxxxGEL.org , so its not an exact match on the trademark, but it does contain it.
and i have another domain that they havent found yet, that is a similar amazon site, with the domain xxxxxxSPRAY.org.
Whats interesting, is that the sites used to make me a little bit of easy cash each day for over a year each, sitting on page 1 of google for most terms related to them. Then they send me an e-mail demanding i give them the domain and the sites suddenly plummet and dance around from page 20 - 100, and its been like that ever since for a couple of months now.... I'm not saying the company had anything to do with the sites ranking lower, it was probably the G' update, but it makes it a hell of a lot easier for me to just let the domains go if i'm forced to.
Its not worth my time (or money) bothering with these sites, and even though i did initially reply to their email, they have given me no further response. They gave me a deadline to take the site down, but fucked up the date and put April 12th 2010 rather than 2011, so if nothing else they'll need to provide me with another deadline, assuming they ever even get back to me.
I received an email from lawyers demanding i transfer my domain name to them immediately, and that i remove all copyrighted images from my site.
Funny thing is, the 'copyrighted images' are the ones that shopperpress pulls in from Amazon, it's an amazon affiliate site.
My domain name is a .org and consists of a combination similar to something like this, where xxxxx is the companies name/trademark:
xxxxxGEL.org , so its not an exact match on the trademark, but it does contain it.
and i have another domain that they havent found yet, that is a similar amazon site, with the domain xxxxxxSPRAY.org.
Whats interesting, is that the sites used to make me a little bit of easy cash each day for over a year each, sitting on page 1 of google for most terms related to them. Then they send me an e-mail demanding i give them the domain and the sites suddenly plummet and dance around from page 20 - 100, and its been like that ever since for a couple of months now.... I'm not saying the company had anything to do with the sites ranking lower, it was probably the G' update, but it makes it a hell of a lot easier for me to just let the domains go if i'm forced to.
Its not worth my time (or money) bothering with these sites, and even though i did initially reply to their email, they have given me no further response. They gave me a deadline to take the site down, but fucked up the date and put April 12th 2010 rather than 2011, so if nothing else they'll need to provide me with another deadline, assuming they ever even get back to me.