Wednesday, December 5, 2018

#378 - panavision.ca - TRANSFER GRANTED

The Complainant owns the PANAVISION family of trademarks, and is one of the world's most recognized providers of ultra-precision digital imaging and visual cinematographic equipment and other accessories for the motion picture, television, and related industries. The Registrant is using the Domain Name as a pay-per-click site.  The Registrant filed a deficient response including a cover page, Registration certification and several blank pages. Despite an invitation to submit an amended complaint, he failed to do so.

The Panel held that the Domain Name was registered in bad faith by a serial cybersquatter, Daniel Mullen. The Complainant relied on the numerous unauthorized domain name decisions involving Mr. Mullen: birkenstocks.ca, oscardelarenta.ca, chipotles.ca, royalcanadianlegion.ca, balenciaga.ca, louisvilleslugger.ca, cadillacs.ca, and canadagoosestore.ca.

Interestingly, there was a dissenting opinion of James Plotkin.  He found that the Domain Name was not registered in bad faith because there is no evidence *in this case* that Daniel Mullen registered the Domain Name to prevent the Complainant from doing so. Additionally, he finds that the Panel should not rely on UDRP principles, and that no visitor to the website would think it was the Complainant's website or that the Complainant was affiliated with it. 

You can read the decision here.

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