FYI: . . . One of the key issues of trademarks in cyberspace involves cybersquatting, or domain-name hijacking, a process in which a person or business tries to snap up the names of popular companies or trademark holders, then resell them to those commercial interests at a substantial markup. Although trademark disputes are actually on the decline in the Internet's top-level domains of ".com," ".net" and ".org," a main objective of the WIPO proposal is to get a system discouraging that practice in place before ICANN adds new top-level domains, like ".shop" or ".firm," to the Internet's addressing system. But on Wednesday, a Miami law professor who is on the panel of experts that WIPO consulted for input in drafting the recommendations, released a 55-page critique of the proposal that says the WIPO went too far in its effort to curb cybersquatting. A. Michael Froomkin, a law professor at the University of Miami, said WIPO had overstepped its charge and tried to "solve every imagined intellectual property problem related to domain names, instead of concentrating on the trademark-related issues that most urgently need solution." "In doing so, it threatens to create an unprecedented opportunity for trademark holders to attempt reverse domain-name hijacking at the expense of unrepresented parties," he wrote in the report, which he made public at a WIPO meeting in Brussels. . . . See the whole story at: http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/99/02/cyber/articles/19wipo.html
