Memo to Nissan Motor Company: it was because of this act of lawfare that I personally renounced ever buying a Nissan again (even though the Altima and Maxima were excellent cars). You deserve to be punished for your actions. I regret that refusing to give you my business isn't worth more.
If you look at his site, when it was a computer shop, fine. Then he started running ads (really trying to profit off nissan motor's brand) related to cars. Then he got taken to court. He played off like a victim forever.
Did he have a legitimate reason to buy the domain originally? Absolutely.
Did he infringe on Nissan's trademark? Almost surely, which is why he was forced to stop.
No real good guy in this story.
What's my background on this? I helped build the most comprehensive database for domain name legal cases (https://udrp.tools) and tend to be involved in areas regarding domain name registrant rights. IP lobby is already way too strong, picking something like Nissan.com as the rallying call really isn't the right move. There is going to be some balance.
If you want egregious, lookup france.com
https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/supreme-court-wont-...
The french government intervened in a case and took france.com from the owner claiming sole right to using 'France'
That is bullshit. ICANN is also trying to take away domain name holder's rights to even go to court at all, in case it's an IGO (https://freespeech.com/2022/05/18/icann-igo-working-group-ch...). IGO thinks your domain infringes on your rights? You have zero recourse, and they want to grant immunity from the legal system.
There are some real fucking injustices happening in the domain world that nobody is paying attention too. Nissan.com isn't one of them.
In the scheme of ethical philosophy there is, pretty much by definition, the most extreme position of "might is right". The principle text on which is attributed to one "Ragnar Redbeard" [1].
The philosophy is simple. I may rob you, rape you, vandalise, ransack, lie, pillage and kill, for the one simple reason that I am stronger and you are the weaker. And the "rule of law" (insofar as it can exist) must recognise that as my legitimate right. It is obviously an infantile fantasy. Yet I see it echoed in various forms within these pages.
First of all, it is something that nobody of sound mind believes, other than as a pose. It is an anchor point, a strawman from which to develop real ethical positions.
But most of all, it's a fantasy we occasionally wish as true, because if it were, these so-called "powerful corporations" would be reduced to dust and ruin within days by those the real powers in this world who exercise patient restraint.
Valve, despite controlling something like 80% of PC game sales, hasn't gone after the owner guy who owns steam.com
According to german law "A private person with that name had priority over someone not called that. A company of that name, or a company with a registered trademark has precedence over a person of that name. A city or municipality has the highest precedence"
My understanding was that Nissan hadn't even made an offer before suing him for 10M, at least that is how the story goes. They probably could have just offered him a million, or 10, and everyone is happy. Being they are a "large" corporation and all.
It's entirely possible the registrant of a toyota.com (if Toyota the company didn't get it first) would have been made an offer for the domain that would have been easy to accept. Nissan (the owner of nissan.com) was never made a fair offer for his domain.
that may be so, but it doesn't make it a good thing, or something we should accept. corporatism is bleeding the world dry, and nearly everyone seems content to sit back and watch. corporations will be corporations, we lament, but resolutely fail to do anything about
Etoys got a US judge to seize the etoy.com domain name.
Etoy launched back with Toy War. A gamified activist platform were participants could earn points by attacking Etoys.
why advertise for them for free?
Does one guy whose name it happens to be really own it more than Nissan Motor Company?
I wonder if Mazda has faced any objections from Zoroastrians.
Almost 100% of people when they hear "Nissan" think of the car company, so why should that domain direct to some random guy who happened to claim it first?
An Even better example is what if Apple Music had registered Apple.com first? At the time, many, many more people had heard of the beatles then computer company in California.
Which leads to scalpers trying to buy out brand names ahead of the corporations so they'll be offered money for them later?
Personally, I stopped buying Nissan cars because of bad experiences/failed transmissions right after warranty expired.
https://asiatimes.com/2022/06/former-nissan-executive-greg-k...
When I first heard about this back in High School, I had the same reaction. I hope they put back up the old website or at least a memorial page for him.
Perhaps in the 90s early 00s. Their CVT is known to be very problematic
So the only thing I can do is just raise awareness, and tell people who ask me if there is any relation (when they see/hear my last name) to not support them!
Say I feel a lot of respect to e.g. Amelia Earhart, so much so that I want to establish an air-exploration company and name it Earhart Air Explorers. Do I need to get an approval from all of her descendants first?
Here's one of the last standing copies: https://web.archive.org/web/20220406221134/https://nissan.co...
Oh, and digest.com where he told is lawsuit story is now for sale (http://digest.com/)
https://web.archive.org/web/20220402233023/https://digest.co...
If you want to look up some really terrible UDRP decisions regarding things that can't typically be trademarked under almost all legal systems (place and family names etc), the barcelona.com case is pretty famous. Same too with mcdonalds.com. Nissan.com is just another example sadly.
There have even been UDRP cases where the panel has claimed using WHOIS anonymization was an "act of bad faith" and handed the domain to the pursuer. It's a wild system.
> https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/help/dndr/udrp-en
> https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/policy-2012-02-25-en
Example of what? The car company never won a UDRP case against Mr Nissan.
That's the thing about corporations: they outlive people. It took Disney 79 years and the trade of a sportscaster's career to get Oswald the Lucky Rabbit back, but they did it.
Was my thought, hope he had put this in his estate with some reasonable transfer procedure
The website is up for me, however the content is stripped down relative to the previous version ( https://web.archive.org/web/20220406221134/https://nissan.co... ). All of the anti-Nissan content is gone and it simply says "Contact Us"
Given the events, I wouldn't be surprised if his estate is moving toward trying to sell the domain and collect any possible proceeds.
Nissan Motors vs. Nissan Computer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25622386 - Jan 2021 (1 comment)
Nissan.com (is not owned by Nissan the car company) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24369990 - Sept 2020 (102 comments)
Nissan Motor's Lawsuit Against Us - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20680958 - Aug 2019 (1 comment)
Uzi Nissan Spent 8 Years Fighting Nissan Motor Company to Keep Nissan.com - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16670141 - March 2018 (83 comments)
Nissan Motors LawSuit Against Nissan Computer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15919367 - Dec 2017 (5 comments)
Nissan vs. Nissan (2008) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10030968 - Aug 2015 (21 comments)
Why You Can’t Buy a Car on Nissan.com – Now I Know - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9692059 - June 2015 (4 comments)
Why Nissan.com Isn’t a Car Website - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6073980 - July 2013 (85 comments)
The website was up just the other month, so this is a new development by his family/heirs.
That Nissan Motors didn't immediately grab the domain after his passing may be evidence that domain names are an inheritable asset? Any lawyers have info on this?
Each to his own though. Not a hill I would have chosen to die on.
