LOS ANGELES — Watch out for cybersquatters trying to ride on the coattails of your company’s adult brands by adding “VR” to domain names.
In recent months, there have been attempts by individuals apparently seeking to capitalize on the virtual reality, or VR, craze that the adult entertainment industry has suddenly found itself enamored with.
Just today, La Touraine Inc, which does business as the famous adult brand Naughty America, terminated its claim against a respondent who purchased and eventually gave up to the company the domain names “NaughtyAmericaVR.com” and “VRNaughtyAmerica.com.”
Naughty America counsel caught the cybersquatters without delay, using the necessary tools for defense — trademarks and claims under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy, known as UDRP — and now the company is the guardian of the domain names.
“Naughty America is one of the smartest and best-managed companies in this business,” adult industry Marc Randazza of Randazza Legal Group told XBIZ. “They registered their marks and they police them.”
Randazza, who does not represent either of the parties, commented: “Even though this might have seemed like a trifle at some point, Naughty America’s general counsel is a smart guy who knows that if you don’t protect your mark, you wind up losing it.”
Randazza emphasized that adult entertainment companies should always police their marks.
“Not just for VR added to the beginning of it,” he said. “They should keep an eye on any domain names that could interfere with their trademarks in any way — even if they think that they might not draw much traffic, and they should invest the effort into wresting those domains from the cybersquatters.
“If they do not, each one of them acts to erode the trademark. If you wait until a trademark infringement feels like a problem, it is a lot more difficult and expensive to fix.”