In January, a controversial decision was made by the Nominet Dispute Resolution Service ordering that MySpace.co.uk be transferred to MySpace. The decision was controversial because MySpace.co.uk had been purchased before the well known MySpace even existed, and its use as a parking page had not changed because of the existence of MySpace.
An independent appeals panel has now overturned this decision.
The appeals judgement said:
The registration of domain names is still a first-come, first-served system and the panel is reluctant to place any duty on a registrant, who has merely had the good fortune (or maybe ill-fortune) to register a domain in good faith, which subsequently, through no fault of his own, provided he does nothing to actively exploit his position [appeals panel emphasis].
In this case, the domain owner had originally run a business on the domain that was no longer in operation. In 2004, the domain was parked with Sedo. As MySpace gained in popularity, Sedo starting serving adds for MySpace related services (such as "MySpace Friend Adder"). The panel accepted that the domain owner had not interfered with the MySpace related ads that were automatically served by Sedo parking software.
The domain owner was represented by Jim Davies, one of the outsiders running for the Nominet board. Part of his election platform is that there should be independence between Nominet and its Dispute Resolution Services, so that decisions like the original one in this case can be avoided.
Jeff Behrendt