Volume 1 Issue 5

1 5 January 2002

Features:

Domain Names - A&F Trademark Inc. and Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc. v Justin Jorgensen, in which abercrombieandfilth.com was transferred to the clothing chain, is the first decision (ICANN or Court) on the parody defence in the context of a domain name and website.

Trade Mark - Buy.Com Inc failed in its application to register the mark “Buy.com” as a Community Trade Mark. demonstrating how difficult it will prove to register a domain name made up of a common word and a common top level domain without cast iron evidence of distinctiveness.

Domain Names China - Beijing Higher People’s Court has issued final judgments in domain name dispute cases involving foreign parties including dupont.com.cn, ikea.com.cn, cartier.com.cn, whisper.com.cn, tide.com.cn and viagra.com.cn.

Online Liability - In The Times v Loutchansky important questions were addressed in relation to qualified privilege and limitation in defamation actions, in particular in relation to the storage of defamatory or potentially defamatory articles on an internet archive.

Data Protection - In Robertson v City of Wakefield Metropolitan Council and the Secretary of State, Mr Justice Kay agreed to a judicial review of the electoral registration officer’s refusal to exclude Mr Robertson’s details from lists sold to third parties.

Online Liability - In Totalise plc v (1) The Motley Fool Ltd (2) Interactive Investor Ltd, the Court of Appeal helped to clarify the situation for providers of bulletin boards against whom disclosure may be sought by a potential Claimant against one of its customers.

Parallel Imports - The landmark European Court of Justice case Levi’s v Tesco has implications for both trade mark owners and e-tailers when considering the sale of trade mark goods on the internet.

Online Dispute Resolution - Evolution of an application service provider.

Patents - Hilgraeve Corporation v Symantec Corporation illustrates the difficulty that alleged infringers may face in the US Courts in resisting claims of infringement at an early stage of the proceedings in software actions given the complex issues of fact involved with this type of subject matter.

Unsolicited Email - Two US appeal court cases, one in Washington and one in California have upheld State laws restricting unsolicited commercial emails.