Canadian lawyers disputed the ownership of the domain name <fertilitylawcanada.com> under the UDRP and in an arbitration decision released yesterday, the panel held that common names for areas of legal practice are generally non-distinctive and there was no secondary meaning in this case.
In a decision published by CIRA (PDF), a dispute panel of three members held that the domain name <sunbrella.ca> be transferred to the complainant. The panel was the first panel to consider the new Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy that came into force in August.
Last week, in Tucows.Com Co. v. Lojas Renner, 2011 ONCA 548, the Ontario Court of Appeal determined that a domain name was “personal property in Ontario” for the purposes of jurisdiction under Rule 17.02(a) after a UDRP proceeding had already been started.
CIRA has announced that they are implementing a new set of policies and rules for domain name disputes. The new CDRP includes changes to the meaning of “use”, “confusingly similar” and “bad faith” along with a host of other changes and will come into force August 22, 2011.