What are my options??

[gooderpoker]

I bought a .net domain of a pokeroom with the intention to use it and affiliate their product. But when i contacted them they did not want me to use the domain to affiliate them. Before asking me they emailed my host with a Cease and Desist notice.

So I took all their info down and rebranded the site to offer easy poker bonuses and sites that are easy to play on. I also put a disclaimer saying in no way are we connected of affiliated. Today they emailed me saying to stop or they will send Cease and Desist notice against me and also filing a dispute with ICANN.

But am i doing anything wrong? If they want the domain should they not have to pay for it? I feel I am getting bullied and presured into giving it up for little to nothing.

I would appreciate your thoughts on how to proceed

[Lenny]

if your one of there affiliates, and they know who you are they can close your affiliate account, so be sure it is worth it to you.

If you do not affiliate them, or make no money with them, and dont care to ever open an account with them, then keep the domain. promote other products on it.

[LadyHoldem]

You could be in trademark violation, depends on the words involved in the domain. You might check with a lawyer if that's an option for you. If the words are really common dictionary words, you might be alright, if not, then maybe not.

[pokerprop]

Even if common dictionary words you probably still are still violating their trademarks. They are an online poker site, you're using their terms to promote other online poker sites. Your intention is to violate this.

It is not a case where site is PokerStars.com for example and you do a site TopPokerStars.com that provides info on the best poker players / stars of poker without marketing steered to send PokerStars.com players / traffic to another site intentionally.

When you're just using their domain name to gather traffic of theirs and send to a competitor it is much different.

The battle is up to you. Depending how malicious the use is, some of the other programs you promote might even have an issue with the tactic. If it were me I'd 301 redirect the entire site to a new domain and choose a different battle.

[Gydian]

TM Violation and what's commonly referred to as Cyber Squatting (if you're trying to sell it to them for profit).

You'll get ordered to hand over the domain, and at the most, all they have to give you is reg fee for it. Been in this battle before and it's -not- worth the time. You almost never win it.

Like prop said, 301 to a different domain, and either let the domain sit and die, or hand it over to them.

[gooderpoker]

Thanks for all your input it has helped me come to a decision.
Helpfully we can make a deal or all sit on it like you have said and 301 direct it.

[Self Made]

Start a PokerRoomName Sucks site. Only half kidding. They couldn't get ICANN to transfer such a domain.

[Satya]

I bought a .net domain of a pokeroom with the intention to use it and affiliate their product. But when i contacted them they did not want me to use the domain to affiliate them. Before asking me they emailed my host with a Cease and Desist notice.

So I took all their info down and rebranded the site to offer easy poker bonuses and sites that are easy to play on. I also put a disclaimer saying in no way are we connected of affiliated. Today they emailed me saying to stop or they will send Cease and Desist notice against me and also filing a dispute with ICANN.

But am i doing anything wrong? If they want the domain should they not have to pay for it? I feel I am getting bullied and presured into giving it up for little to nothing.

I would appreciate your thoughts on how to proceed

Depends a lot on the domain and the status of the trademark rights the pokerroom has for this word. Most of the times it is not easy for the poker room to recover a domain from a squatter (not that I think you are one). But considering the fact that the poker room has not registered the .net domain for their main brand, I would doubt the trademark status on the domain.

But like I said a lot depends on the domain. If you not using it to get type in traffic or ranking for their brand, you should be safe. It is cheaper for a poker room to pay up to $1000 -1500 and acquire the domain from you rather than going the litigation way.

[PokaPaloma]

301 redirect to a new domain name. Keep your energy in the positive zone. Wait a little to see if they make a reasonable bid for the name and sell. Don't hold out for the big bucks...they will escalate the process.

Info I have from a conference I attended says that first person/business to do business with the name (not the extension) will win. Seems like they have already started the UDRP process - which is the informal process. If they move to the ACPA process - the formal process - that is time consuming (6 mos. to years) and expensive and after all that time and money is invested, 80 - 90% of those still settle before court.

Stay positive. Start generating your own bucks promoting every other website.

[Stocks]

If its the exact match like if it was PokerStars.com and you owned PokerStars.net sell it to them for a lot of money I think most poker rooms these days would want the .net version of they're domain. although if they dont already own it they're probably either morons or not much of a poker room.