Good afternoon everyone.

I have been asked a few weeks ago by a friend of mine and member of this forum to go give my opinion of this topic. Sorry for getting here so late but we have been very busy at work (as usual).

I am a lawyer and my firm here in Madrid specializes in intellectual property law.

I have read some of the posts on this topic and I understand the support MadridMan receives from all of you, it is very nice and helpful to him for sure.

Unfortunately, these WIPO cases are pretty straightforward and sadly this case will not have a positive outcome for MadridMan.

It all comes down to the following:

1) The madrid2012.com domain will be lost since it is the exact name of the company that has started the arbitration process. This company existed before MadridMan registered the domain in question. No need to go any further.

2) The 2M12.com/.org/.info domains will be lost since they are composed of the official registered trademark of the Madrid 2012 olympics ("2M12"). This trademark was registered well before MadridMan registered the domains and is all over the marketing and publicity that the city does for the olympics.

MadridMan, I think you were unsucessful in getting free legal help due to the fact that we (lawyers and firms who specialize in this material) know that most cases that are brought to arbitration are lost by the defendant (about 98% of them), hence the long hours put into the defence end up being wasted and worse than worse if they are pro-bono hours.

Arbitration with WIPO is taken very seriously and it cost the people at Madrid 2012 S.A. $1,500 U.S. Dollars to start the arbitration (plus many lawyer fees). Most companies do not get into this unless they are destined to win the case.

I do not like to be the messenger of bad news, I just wanted to give my professional opinion.

Take care,
Ric

It would seem that this topic is dead, yes?

I did not want to scare people away.

There has been a new devlopment in one of the domain names related to the Madrid 2012 games and I thought you should all see it.

The article is at http://elmundo.es/navegante/2003/10/13/esociedad/1066046175.html

This computer company here lost the madrid2012.org domain name and it is because of my reason #1 above that I gave for madrid2012.com.

Take care,
Ric

ric_legal: I can't really talk about the details of the case just yet. I'll update the thread when I have the ruling in the coming days/weeks.

Saludos, MadridMan

The ruling reached me this morning:

MADRID2012.com, 2M12.com, 2M12.org, & 2M12.info will be transferred to Madrid 2012, S.A.. They won and I lost.

I based much of my argument, incorrectly as it turned out, that Madrid 2012, S.A. did not yet exist until AFTER I registered MADRID2012.com AND they didn't apply for the trademark for "MADRID 2012" until AFTER I registered my dot com of the same name.

Turns out that the company Madrid Nuevo Siglo WAS RENAMED to Madrid 2012, S.A.. It was my (apparent incorrect) understanding that Madrid 2012, S.A. was a "spin-off" or "daughter company" of Madrid Nuevo Siglo but it just RENAMED itself. The originally named company existed in early 2000. So really, that's where it begins and ends and that's where my case was lost.

Regarding the other 2M12.xxx domain names, my argument stood on the fact that Madrid 2012, S.A. ONLY owned GRAPHICAL trademarks and not textual trademarks of the same term. I had seen this argument successfully upheld in other cases but apparently it didn't matter as one represented the other.

I was absolutely confident that I was going to RETAIN these domain names because I did my research and had submitted a first-class, thorough Response. I was certain. That makes the loss all the more disappointing. And that's where this discussion ends. TOPIC CLOSED. Time to put these last 3.5 stressful months behind me.

Disappointed, sad, & feeling abused, MadridMan