Mike, it's not that simple. The MSN trademark does not entirely prohibit 
others from using those 3 letters in a business name or domain name, in 
certain circumstances, you could possibly even get away with msn.com.au 
as a domain if it was for example an abbreviation of your business name. 
As long as you don't then use that domain for anything related to a 
Microsoft product, you will not be affected by the trademark.

I can understand why people think that registrars would purposely avoid 
having to reject domains, but people really do need to understand that 
things are not as simple as they think. There are good reasons why 
billions of dollars are spent on intellectual property lawyers every 
year, it is a complicated field. It certainly is not something I could 
expect my staff to make decisions on.

Bennett.


Mike wrote:

> Bennett,
> 
> I think any reasonable person looking at an application for anthing with 
> MSN in it would reject it on the grounds that it is a registered 
> trademark owned by someone apart from the person who's applying for it..
> 
> There is a req in the policies that covers trademarks..
> If there's a req. why not a check of the trademark database prior to a 
> domain being issued..
> Then it's auto..
> Infringers are stopped at the pass..
> ATMOSS returns 15 entries for MSN..
> 
> As for cancelled warranties..
> Do we really want to go there..
> Grandfathering will make it a legal nightmare, not to mention the 
> history of a FCFS start, then semi regulated, then regulated, then 
> auctions, now rollback on geographics..
> 
> FCFS would make it a whole lot easier than most people think..
> 
> 
> Mike.
> 
> http://whois.com.au/forums/
> 
> Bennett Oprysa wrote:
> 
>> Hi,
>>
>> can you explain on what grounds a registrar would reject such an 
>> application?
>>
>> There are numerous reasons why it could be perfectly feasible, eg
>> applicant provides support/advice specific to msnmessenger
>> applicant sells addons for msnmessenger
>> applicant has their own product called msnmessenger or something similar
>>
>> all of the above are without question appropriate reasons for 
>> registering the domain, for all we know the registrant may well fit 
>> one of the above when applying for a domain. Do you expect registrars 
>> to do a site visit and conduct interviews with the employees of the 
>> company to make sure their claim is true for every application?
>>
>> If the registrant has made a false warranty they risk losing the 
>> domain. If they have also missused a trademark belonging to a 
>> multinational, they also face the risk of incurring considerable legal 
>> costs when the lawyers descend upon them.
>>
>> As far as registrars being too lenient, the simple fact is that the 
>> number of registrations cancelled by auDA due to people having made 
>> false warranties can be counted on one hand last time I checked.
>>
>> Bennett.
>>
> 
> 
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