This weeks discussion with ICANN's ombudsman has inspired me to mention a recent case about domain names. An article that I read in the Wall Street Journal has much prevalence to this topic. Another issue that comes to mind from this article is about changing pornographic websites to end with the .xxx tag.
Goldman Sachs wants to take the porn website goldmansex.com off the Internet because they believe that the website would cause confusion and the financial company does not want any confusion with an adult website being that similar to the large firm. If the financial company is this concerned about this one website having too much affiliation with the company, then what if my last name was Goldman and I play the saxophone and I wanted to promote lessons over the Internet at goldmansax.com? Does Goldman Sachs have jurisdiction over the domain name? I think noy. There is no similarity over the intent of my website but strictly a phonetic similarity when saying the name. Or, if I had experience with the financial company and it turned out to be a bad experience, am I entitled to create a website called golmansuchs.com?
This leads to my second issue with the article. If the pornographic website was changed to have the .xxx tag at the end, then Goldman Sachs wins and does not have to do anything outside of the realm of the company to maintain the integrity of the company. However, should the pornographic site be sold to the financial company? Whatever one's views are about the issue are important, but the way domain names are set up over the Internet it is a first come first serve basis. So who really wins?
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