An international panel has sided with Madonna, evicting a US businessman from the Internet address madonna.com.
Madonna, whose latest album, Music, debuted at the top of the charts in September, filed the complaint in July at the Geneva-based World Intellectual Property Organization against a New Jersey pornography entrepreneur.
The panel found that Dan Parisi “lacks rights or legitimate interests in the domain name” and that the name “has been registered and used in bad faith.”
Today, WIPO announced that a three-member panel had ordered Parisi to transfer the site to Madonna. The panel said Parisi had no trademark right to the name Madonna and failed to prove legitimate interest in the domain name.
WIPO said this was not the first cyber squatting case involving Parisi, who had also registered domain names such as wallstreetjournal.com.
This isn’t the first time WIPO has ruled in favor of celebrities.
Julia Roberts recently won the rights to her name, as did prog-rockers Jethro Tull. Sting, on the other hand, failed in his attempt win sting.com, because WIPO decided sting was “a common English word.”
Meanwhile, the www.madonna.com sight currently boasts exerpts from Madonna’s limited edition Sex book, as well as a statement saying that they will stick to their beliefs.
The site also has a link to the decision reading: We find in favor of the Complainant. The disputed domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark in which Complainant has rights; Respondent lacks rights or legitimate interests in the domain name; and the domain name has been registered and used in bad faith. Therefore, we decide that the disputed domain name should be transferred to the Complainant.
In other Madonna news, her new baby, Rocco Ritchie, is already making waves across the pond. The BBC’s new celebrity magazine, Star, has included him in its list of Britain’s most eligible bachelors under the age of 24. At 2 months, Rocco is actually under the age of 1, and likely won’t begin dating anytime soon. – Albawaba.com.
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