Legal context: Domain name disputes now form a significant practice
area for IP lawyers. However, they rarely merit the expense of
litigation. The favoured route to resolution of these disputes tends to
be the Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) policies for the various
domains, the most used of which is the Uniform Domain Name Dispute
Resolution Policy (UDRP), which celebrates its 10th anniversary this
year (2009).
Key points: Complaints launched under the UDRP are decided by
independent panellists selected from lists held by the various UDRP
service providers, one of which is the World Intellectual Property
Organization. The panellists are mainly trade mark lawyers. They come
from all over the world. That fact combined with the fact that there is
no system of binding precedent under the UDRP means that there is scope
for divergence of view among panellists. Of late, panellists have been
demonstrating potentially significant divergence of views in relation to
the practices of domainers (ie entities whose business is the
commercial exploitation of domain names). This article celebrates the
success of the UDRP over the last 10 years, but highlights the need for
consensus among panellists if the UDRP is to maintain its usefulness in
the face of these new domainer practices and principally the automated
bulk transfer and commercialisation of domain names.
Practical significance: If some route to consensus is not found (by
amendment to the UDRP or otherwise), there is a risk that the outcome of
disputes involving domainers as respondents will become something of a
lottery, leading to a reduced willingness on the part of rights owners
to rely on an otherwise cheap and effective form of ADR.
To download this research in paper by Tony Willoughby in the Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice in full, see:
jiplp.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/4/10/714
- Follow us on :
