Trademarks can lead into a heated debate almost all the time and domain names are no different. There are a lot of things that can come into play and often times rulings are made based on trademarks that many do not fully agree on. Generic 3 letter domain names is one that many think is BS when a company claims they have the right to an acronym and even worse when a company obtains a domain name via UDRP with that claim. Same thing for generic terms like Ad. Now every case is a little bit different and sometimes things are clear cut but many are not.

Domain name owners are often hit with UDRP and WIPO cases that force them to legally prove they have the right to own a domain name over somebody else. Many cases are more clear than others, some are just plain obvious IMO.

Add in the factor of an expired domain name now. Who owns it when the domain is expired? Many whois records change to the domain name registrar when a domain name expires and if an expired domain name is sold during this process, I would say who profits from the sale is the "owner" of the domain name no matter what the whois records show as ownership. If it is more than one entity who profits from the sale, then it should be considered that way as well based on who profits.

Here are some examples of what I mean:

~ Say a clear trademark domain name expires and it is registered with NetworkSolutions.com . IMO, when a domain name sells like this, there becomes 3 owners in most cases. The past registrant, because NSI’s TOS states that 20% of the sale proceeds go to the past owner (the past owner can opt out of this and the domain wouldn’t go to auction) if the expired domain name sells. To me, this means if the domain name goes to auction and sells, they are profiting from a trademark. NameJet gets a portion of the sale proceeds for auctioning off the domain name if it sells and lastly, NSI gets the remaining amount if it sells. Again, all profiting from a trademark IMO.

~ GoDaddy. An expired domain goes to auction 25 days after reaching expired date for a 10 day auction, GoDaddy becomes the sole owner IMO, as they keep the profit from the expired domain name sale, if it sells. They auction domain names in-house, so no profits go to an auction service, no profits go to the past owner of the domain name and they are the registrar.

So why did I use the title that I did? GoDaddy Auctions™, The pot calling the kettle black!

I find it pretty interesting that GoDaddy makes it very clear to its customers that it is not "OK" to list 3rd party registered trademarked domains. In their words: Go Daddy Auctions™ sellers are responsible for ensuring domain names do not infringe on third-party trademarks. (see highlighted yellow box below)

But then THEY (Godaddy) have expired domain names with clear trademarks in them, that they list? Tires Plus® (highlighted above) is a registered trademark of Tires Plus Groupe, Ltd. since 1994 and I would say most would agree with me that this is a clear trademarked term.

To me, this is GoDaddy (the pot) calling the kettle black!

I guess I could list endless "trademarked" domain names that GoDaddy currently has listed for sale as expiring domain name auctions and you can see them as well doing searches with "brand names". Same thing goes for the majority, if not all expired domain auction providers. Some are more clear they are trademarked terms than others as I stated above but I still think this is not right. GoDaddy shines the spotlight a little bit more with the text they put right on their auction page that sellers insure domain names do not infringe but then GoDaddy has expiring domain auctions listed themselves that can be clear trademarks.

Verizon filed suit against domain name registrar DirectNIC recently as reported by DomainNameWire.com for parking domain names with Verizon’s trademark after the domains expired. Verizon is claiming that DirectNIC became the owner of 288 domains during the expired domain process with that suit filed. Often times when a domain name expires, the domain name registrar will change the DNS to a company owned landing page, which often displays ads. Often times the whois details change to the registrar as well, but not always. The registrar then profits from any clicks the ads may get on the landing pages. Most registrars change DNS when a domain name expires to a landing page of some sort they own.

As Andrew stated, depending on the outcome of that suit, it could greatly change what domain name registrars show on these landing pages and or expired domain name pages. I also think this same suit could have some interesting outcomes with what happens with expired domain names with registrars selling many and profiting from the sale of them.

I do not think there is a clear or easy solution to this problem. One could say that "clear" trademarked domains be released to the trademark owner or the registry or some trademark pool etc. but who is to judge what is a "clear trademark" or not. I am just not a fan of GoDaddy telling its customers one thing and they do the other.