gTLD applicants get nasty, file trademarks to deter competitors

In the United States, domain extensions cannot be registered as trademarks. That hasn’t stopped some gTLD applicants in other countries in order to gain an upper hand over competitors, however. One notable example is Constantine Roussos, who has filed some 20 trademarks in hopes of preventing anyone else but him from applying for the .music gTLD:

Rest assured that if we, as .MUSIC are faced with the possibility of being gamed and abused in a manner that we find illegal, we will use our trademarks and other means necessary to do what we have to do to protect ourselves and our respective community.

People like Roussos think are they entitled to own a gTLD simply because they thought of it first. As far as I’m concerned, everyone should have an equal chance to operate any extension. If someone can do a better job of running .music than Roussos, let the guy have it.

Photo | Flickr

.DJ domain targets disc jockeys

.DJ is the ccTLD for Djibouti, a small African country southeast of Somalia. With only 11,000 Internet users, the extension is scarcely used at all, and now a company is trying to market the name to DJs across the globe.

As is the case with .eco, I don’t see much of a target for the .DJ name. Sure, some generics like radio.dj and techno.dj are valuable, but does the average DJ need a premium domain? Having a site might be nice, but the price for a .dj registration is £39.99 a year. Disc jockeys do not make very much money, and I doubt most could justify the expense when a perfectly decent .com could be had for a fourth of the price.

In addition, any .dj registration must comply with Islamic moral standards. The country’s government, which is based on Islamic law, requires that no domain be “hurting, confusing, sexual, blasphematory, racist, [or] unecessarily provocative.”

A great deal of Western DJs more than likely play music that would offend more conservative cultures and some even have unsavory names. Would rap.dj violate the rules because many songs of that genre contain inappropriate language? What if a DJ catering to gay night clubs wanted to purchase gay.dj?

The idea sounds good on paper, but I just don’t see many DJs feeling the .DJ beat.