Keep an eye on your intellectual property rights
From next year, possible website domain names are going to multiply wildly, as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the international body that oversees the structure of the Internet, plans to open up the market for domain name extensions, that is, the .com or .uk part of a web address.
The possibilities for new addresses will be almost endless. Examples include city domains such as .berlin, .paris, .london and .nyc, and themed domains such as .music, .legal or .shop.
I’ve always thought that .om domains would be great for relaxation sites, and I’ve mentally renamed several site “.con”.
This new development will also open up a field day for domain squatters, or looked at another way, an opportunity for entrepreneurs to sell valuable new domains – or more troubling for some, new variations on existing domains.
It’s potentially an additional cost for trademark owners, although with so many possibilities name owners will have to draw the line somewhere. There are rules in existence to protect copyrighted names, so there would be some protection against domain name takeover, but its also likely that users will need to pay more attention to the extensions and this adds to the information burden.
A recent survey of consumers (carried out by The Future Laboratory on behalf of domain name registrar Gandi.net) revealed that many did not yet know of the impending changes, and their reactions were not very positive. It was generally felt that this will add to confusion and difficulty in using the internet.
Business owners need to draw up a plan to acquire the extensions that will be most important, and aim to get them quickly before enterprising gold-rushers grab the names and hold them to ransom.
You might of course decide you want to take the opportunity presented to buy up some domains yourself. You may even buy an entire domain, for example, .london so that anyone wanting to use that suffix would have to come to you. But if you do, remember that there will be contests over names and undoubtedly some test cases will eventually emerge. Do you want to be one of them? If not, make sure you are protected.
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Take a look at our Intellectual Property collection here.
