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Nissan.com (is not owned by Nissan the car company)
- robinwa 6y agoNissan tried to sue Uzi Nissan, the owner of the domain, for cyber-squatting and lost...[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Motors_v._Nissan_Computer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Motors_v._Nissan_Comput...
- thrwn_frthr_awy 6y agoI believe Ford sued the owner of volvoguy.com and won.
- dhosek 6y agoI suspect, though that the owner of volvoguy.com wasn't named Joe Volvoguy. It also appears that volvoguy.com is currently a Chinese language website (which Google says simply tells me that service is not available in my area). On the other hand, Ford hasn't owned Volvo in years and the current owners are a Chinese holding company so who knows? (And Volvo Cars, formerly owned by Ford and now Geely Holding Corp, is not to be confused with the publicly traded AB Volvo which makes heavy trucks and which owned Volvo Cars before selling that division to Ford.)
- braythwayt 6y agoYes, big difference between swedishbrickguy.com and volvoguy.com. Up here in the People's Republic of Kanuckistan, Canadian Tire even won a case with someone over crappytire.com. I thought that was heinous, personally, but INAL, so I am biting my tongue and not claiming that the judge erred in law.
- x87678r 6y agoThat site just looks like he's holding out for more money.
- robbyking 6y agoOr that he's taking a principled stand.
- 30minAdayHN 6y agoI think it's a principled stance. I think Nissan made an aggressive move to take it over in early days and it pissed him off.
- eli 6y agoIt’s been 20 years. I don’t think he’s bluffing for more money.
- ilaksh 6y agoHe held out until he passed away.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- thrwn_frthr_awy 6y agoTrying to profit on the mark is what caused Ford to win a lawsuit over a domain auction site that was selling volvoguy.com, jaguarenthusiastsclub.com, vintagevolvos.com, and others. “bad faith intent to profit” cited in the ruling.
- ADent 6y agoThey went after a lot of sites with Volvo in the name - VolvoWorld.com became VlvWorld.com. They have since closed, but they sold parts. https://www.brickboard.com/AWD/volvo/808447/volvoworldcom_offline_please_use_vlvworldcom_volvoworld_vlvworld_parts.html https://www.brickboard.com/AWD/volvo/808447/volvoworldcom_of... http://web.archive.org/web/20040216120352/http://www.vlvworld.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20040216120352/http://www.vlvworl...
- dencodev 6y ago
- 30minAdayHN 6y agoI remember reading the story by the domain owner how nissan tried to screw him with law suit. This is pretty old case and I wonder why it popped up to the top: https://www.digest.com/Big_Story.php https://www.digest.com/Big_Story.php
- 30minAdayHN 6y ago> FEBRUARY - 2008, Ruling on Attorneys' Fees and Final Judgment. The court has issued a Ruling[1] addressing these remaining issues: 1. Nissan Motor is NOT entitled to attorneys' fees. 2. Nissan Computer is entitled to cost under rule 68. The court ordered NMC to pay $58,000 as cost under rule 68, this is less than 2% of what the cost was to defend this case. [1] Ruling: https://www.digest.com/images/FinalJudgment2008.pdf https://www.digest.com/images/FinalJudgment2008.pdf
- alasdair_ 6y ago>this is less than 2% of what the cost was to defend this case Which is ridiculous. The whole point of a legal system is to ensure that even the weak can exist without being bullied by the strong.
- dhosek 6y agoI think because the owner died recently from Covid-19.
- schappim 6y agoI’m amazed that Nissan Motors didn’t eventually get the domain. Normally with sufficient $$$, you can bleed a smaller opponent dry in court. My company had something similar happen to us. We were taken to the Federal Court of Australia by a Florida based educational hardware company in part over a domain. The Australian domain we had, was purchased prior to their registration of Australian trademarks and incorporation of their company.
- searchableguy 6y agoWhat was the outcome? Is it possible to mention the educational hardware company?
- schappim 6y agoWe no longer own a domain that we previously legitimately owned. I won’t mention the complainant's name, however, you gotta respect their (lawful evil?) tactics. Taking a previously open-source product manufactured by (the awesome) SparkFun Electronics, “un-open-sourcing” the product, and moving the manufacturing away from the USA to China. When SparkFun ceased manufacturing the product, the result was that schools in my region are now charged more for this line of products. The complainant's restrictions in their reseller agreements also prevent resellers from selling any competing products. The complainant trademarked the name of the open-source hardware and obtained a second trademark (in the quoted category below[1]). I am not a lawyer, but it could mean that anyone commercially teaching (hear deriving income directly or indirectly) or creating educational content that incorporates the trademarked term could potentially be violating the trademark. [1] “Conducting workshops and seminars in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education; developing education lesson plans for others in the field of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education; educational services, namely, conducting informal programs in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education, using on-line activities and interactive exhibits, and printable materials distributed therewith”
- d_meeze 6y agoI also have to respect your chaotic neutral tactics by posting their trademark wording in its entirety, hence guaranteeing they're the first search hit for that phrase.
- dpc_pw 6y agoI love how crappy this website is. :D . No, not minimalistic, or old school. Just crappy, with terrible usability. :D
- 30minAdayHN 6y agoIt was from the days where people self hosted and used to put up a websites for fun
- Pfhreak 6y agoIt's a shame there are no more people putting up fun websites anywhere. /s
- runbyfruity 6y agoOh, they are, but they're drowned out by "look at this create-react-app hackathon project I made! VCs pls give me a series A thx". Alas, the web is now a profit engine first.
- ilaksh 6y agoIt's more usable than a lot of sites that are completely bloated.
- anon84598 6y ago
- ahale13 6y agoSadly the owner of the domain passed away from Covid-19. See: https://www.gofundme.com/f/Uzi-Nissan https://www.gofundme.com/f/Uzi-Nissan
- polartx 6y agoSitting on the Nissan domain, almost certainly valued at much more than the $50k they’re seeking, it seems out of place to be cyber-panhandling
- BurningFrog 6y agoNissan is also a river in southern Sweden running through the city of Halmstad. I assume that name is older than the car company. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_(river) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_(river)
- dhosek 6y agoJapanese companies often have long and convoluted histories (Nintendo was founded in the 19th century as a maker of playing cards and at various times sold food and was a taxi company). Nissan was founded in 1928 as an offshoot of a mining company and until the Japanese real estate crash of the early 1990s was primarily a real estate company which also made cars. But yes, the river name is still probably older than the company.
- woofie11 6y agoUzi Nissan just died of COVID19. It will be interesting to see if his relatives stick to his principals, and hold onto the web site in memory of him, or make millions and sell to Nissan. I hope they hold on. I predict someone will eventually sell, though. Principled people are few and far between. https://www.autonews.com/automakers-suppliers/uzi-nissan-who-beat-nissan-dies-covid https://www.autonews.com/automakers-suppliers/uzi-nissan-who...
- ajkjk 6y agoWell, selling a website because you don't personally care very much about owning it doesn't necessarily mean someone is unprincipled. Most people don't have a principle of being more attached to their name than millions of dollars. I certainly don't!
- ethbr0 6y agoThe backstory [1] is than Nissan spent years being corporate jackasses to this guy in international legal systems, when he refused to sell. A few million for something I don't care about? Sure! A few million foregone to piss off a corporation who wronged a relative and tried to steal what was rightfully his? No question: nope. And I'd dedicate the page to reasons you shouldn't buy a Nissan. [1] https://jalopnik.com/uzi-nissan-spent-8-years-fighting-the-car-company-with-1822815832 https://jalopnik.com/uzi-nissan-spent-8-years-fighting-the-c...
- schwartzworld 6y agoA few million to let go of a domain name? I'd compromise those principles in a heartbeat and move the site to a different domain.
- koolba 6y agoWhy would the car maker even care about paying top dollar for the domain at this point?
- adtac 6y agoSame reason Tesla bought tesla.com for $11m. Same reason not owning steam.com gives Valve grief.
- supernova87a 6y agoTheir only purpose seems to be to occupy this domain to counter Nissan the car company. Their own actual business doesn't look that remarkable or even successful. It has eclipsed the purpose of existence almost. Maybe time to declare this isn't worth the trouble in life, and there are better things to spend effort on? What are you winning? Sell, and make a buck while you can. There isn't much principled fight to be gained here, is there?
- xwdv 6y agoUnfortunately for some people, principles might be all they have left.
- jagged-chisel 6y ago> Their only purpose seems to be to occupy this domain to counter Nissan the car company. It's the guy's name. He registered the domain 5 years before Nissan Motor Company showed interest. He seems to have started businesses further and further from "automobiles" so that he wouldn't have a trademark dispute with the car company. > Their own actual business doesn't look that remarkable or even successful. Is that the measure by which someone should keep their property?
- baddox 6y agoIt's lots of people's names, of course. I don't agree that domains should be redistributed based continuously purely on "what's the biggest company with this name," but I also don't like how much momentum you get just from being interested in the web in the 90s and picking up the juicy domain names. I don't have a great solution, but I don't think the status quo does a great job of allocating domain names with either economic efficiency or with user-friendliness in mind. Of course, one could certainly argue that domain names are much less important now that most people get their content either directly from the massive media/social networking websites or indirectly from Google searches.
- paultannenbaum 6y agoThis is because of a court ruling: The district court issued a final Judgment (PDF) allowing Nissan Computer to keep its nissan.com and nissan.net domain names, but restricted our rights to do the following: 1. Posting Commercial content at nissan.com and nissan.net; 2. Posting advertising or permitting advertising to be posted by third parties at nissan.com and nissan.net; 3. Posting disparaging remarks or negative commentary regarding Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. or Nissan North America, Inc. at nissan.com and nissan.net; 4. Placing, on nissan.com or nissan.net, links to other websites containing commercial content, including advertising; and 5. Placing, on nissan.com or nissan.net, links to other websites containing disparaging remarks or negative commentary regarding Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. or Nissan North America. https://www.digest.com/Big_Story.php https://www.digest.com/Big_Story.php
- slg 6y agoThis reminds me of the story of the pair of twins that own twins.com who refused to sell it to Major League Baseball and the Minnesota Twins. https://grantland.com/features/the-website-mlb-couldnt-buy/ https://grantland.com/features/the-website-mlb-couldnt-buy/
- ThomPete 6y agoneither is Square.com owned by Square.
- citrusui 6y agoThey actually appear to own square.com, though it redirects to squareup.com
- ThomPete 6y agothey lease it
- Pfhreak 6y agoSquare the software company that makes games? Or Square the software company that makes payment processing?
- ThomPete 6y agosquare the software company uses square enix domain.
- ecf 6y agoThis story represents everything that’s wrong with domains. On one hand, you have someone with absolutely no use for the the name holding out against an entity that everyone in the world would assume has ownership of it. On the other hand, you have a company that tried to strong arm the small domain owner in court.
- markdown 6y ago> On one hand, you have someone with absolutely no use for the the name No use for the name? He bought it because he had a use for it, and used it till the day he died. There are many other examples you could have used, but not this one. He was not a squatter.
- sokoloff 6y ago> On one hand, you have someone with absolutely no use for the the name How sure are you that they have absolutely no use for the name? If he gets his email and runs family email accounts at name@nissan.com, that's a valid use for the domain, IMO.
- twodave 6y agoNo use for the name? It’s his own last name and he ran a computer consultancy from the website. It wasn’t until Nissan began targeting him that he turned it towards activism, which one might argue is of even greater use.
- alasdair_ 6y agoHis company still sells services to people. It was registered in 1994. Trying to re-do 26 years of configurations and email addresses sounds like a pain in the ass. I'm sure he (or his family) still gets email there. Just because someone wants something more doesn't mean they should automatically get it.
- gazzini 6y agoThis brings a smile to my face. You don’t always need “F* you” in order to say “F* you”. I nearly want to collocate a server with them, just for the heck of it (see their “services” page).
- angst_ridden 6y agoIn the 90s, I worked for a web firm that did the Nissan Motors USA customer-facing web sites. The management at Nissan USA were always sure we'd be switching to the nissan.com domain "any day now." It was impressive how much firepower they expended on Uzi Nissan, and how he was able to fight and hold on by a thread. I secretly sympathized with him, although professionally I had to pretend that the "nissanusa.com" domain was an abomination.
- betoharres 6y ago"any day now." I cracked beautifully xD
- woofie11 6y agoMy experience is that lots of people often secretly sympathize. Including the lawyers involved. It's pretty easy to throw a case.
- angst_ridden 6y agoI had zero power or influence in that situation. I probably wouldn't even have been the person to update the web server configuration if they had got the domain (although, in those days, there were a lot of static HTML pages and Flash content that would have needed updating).
- woofie11 6y agoYou didn't, but I'm just saying others involved did. I'm not sure much of anyone involved on the Nissan side actually cared if Nissan won, except for maybe one or two very senior leaders in Japan, and perhaps not even that. It makes a big difference in a fight.
- mleo 6y agoThe 90s and the days of running websites on Silicon Graphics. There seemingly was some sort of lessen learned since Z.com was acquired more easily before the relaunch of the Z. Though the domain seems to have since been sold to another company.
- stuartd 6y agoThis is the story as I read it the other day: https://jalopnik.com/uzi-nissan-internet-domain-owner-who-fought-nissan-in-1844535615 https://jalopnik.com/uzi-nissan-internet-domain-owner-who-fo...
- rising-sky 6y agoDifferent circumstance but reminds me of the battle Microsoft had with Mike Rowe over mikerowesoft.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_v._MikeRoweSoft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_v._MikeRoweSoft mikerowesoft.com still redirects to microsoft.com
- TheSpiciestDev 6y agoThis reminds me of the steam.com domain - for the longest time I've wondered what the relationship is like between the owner and Valve Corporation... It used to have an actual page, it looks like it's just a registered domain now with a page that times out.
- asveikau 6y agoI once saw a license plate frame of a car dealership called "Nissani Brothers". It was not on a Nissan. Somehow I figured they might rather be selling Nissans.
- jackvalentine 6y agoIf you go to nissanusa.com now, they're selling a Sentra with the tag 'Refuse to compromise'.
- coronadisaster 6y agowhat's your point?
- jackvalentine 6y agoIt's an amusing reflection on both Nissan and Uzi's sticking to their positions.
- coronadisaster 6y agowhen did they start this promotion?
- jackvalentine 6y agoMate, it's clearly not directly related and I suggest you don't read too much in to my comment. It's just a bit of fun.
- coronadisaster 6y agoThats fine... But it would be really screwed up if it was related at all
- jackvalentine 6y agoOK.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- calmworm 6y agoI’ve always liked this story and have been periodically checking the domain for many years. I recall reading the site updates as it was unfolding. Sad he died.
- dag11 6y agoThis feels like the web equivalent of an Edith Macefield house. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Macefield https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Macefield
- Seb-C 6y agoI did not expect to see a site (legitimately) using an HTML 3.2 DOCTYPE in 2020.