i hope this is relevant? its a long story but i want to give you all the info as i feel it is important for the future trend that seems to be happening. this year i had a client in QLD ( he advertised with me on one of my directories but i had nothing to do with his domain rego etc ) and i was contacted by a NSW business who had the same business name as my QLD client which had JUST trademarked their name and insisted i withdraw my clients advertising from my website immmediately as I WAS in break of trademark !!!!
i tried to contact my client but couldn't so i emailed the nsw business this and said i would not act until i had permission from the client.
nsw then emailed me a letter from their solicitor saying that the would sue ME if i didn't remove the ad immediately.
So i rang the guy in nsw, he was a P%*%*%K from the start, and wouldn't stand down from the situation, threatening me again to remoe the advert.
I asked him if he had also contacted the yellow pages and asked them to recall the 400,000 books that my client had advertsied in for that area? i asked him if he had called the fairfax newspaper that had printed 35,000 copies of the yearly local bridal magazine in which my client has an advert in and insisted on them recalling those magazines?
he wasn't happy with my questions.
And the reality is of course he hadn't phone yellowpages etc, but by then my client just gave up as the cost involve to fight would have be silly, and thats a terrible outcome in my eyes.
MY point at this moment is WHY do people think that they can come "late to the game" and change the rules???
My poor client relented and closed his business name and had to start another which means all his hard work and money over the last 6 years went down the drain.
The nsw guy registered his business just 2 years ago.... not 6 like my client.... trademarked it and closed my client down in a different state ! not even a competitor !!! my client is in cairns and the nsw guy is in sydney, no conflict i see.
BUT, the state governments will let you register blablabla in qld and another guy can register blablabla in nsw.
NOW, heres the crunch, the trademark commision with trademark your name for $XXX PER YEAR, but has no powers to enforce it !! nor wants to, and i can trade mark busines "acme" but i have to choose a category eg: weddings: but you can trademark "acme" if choose the category "health" !! its just stupid.
After all this hapened i rang up the trademark people and said "whats going on" ? , and the girl said the above + "but..... if you can prove longevity then it can be overridden" so i went COOL, so what do i do? ... just fil out a form and send it to you? and she said " oh no, a lawyer will need to prove it in court..."
SOOOO, you pay them money and then they do nothing.
this has been my experience please correct me if i have it wrong.
SOOO, i have no opinion on m8e situation, i just thought this true story may be of some help.
sorry if i got a bit OTT but i really got peezed of over this for my client getting screwed over.
YES, he could have trademarked first, but how many of you have done that expense for all your domain businesses?
