BUSTED! iPhone.com now owned by Apple, Inc.
Home » BUSTED! iPhone.com now owned by Apple, Inc.There was a point recently, where the ads appearing on iPhone.com, began to cross the line of someone simply looking to run a business, and someone who was clearly deriving profit from Apple, Inc's joint trademark with Cisco. The whole descent into ad-monger was detailed in a previous article, and is experted below. Apparently, Apple has finally caught up with them, and however it has been worked out, the domain name now uses Apple's nameservers, and redirects to Apple's iPhone website joining iPhone.org is Apple's iPhone domain name portfolio. It seems like this was only a matter of time, and could possibly have already been in progress when the ads began to show up last week.
Clearly, advertising competitive products under a trademarked domain name (ie. music playing phones), is NOT the way to go if you wish to keep your domain name. Odds are however, the previous owner has agreed not to discuss the settlement (or near-miss legal action).
iPhone.com - Casualty of War (expcerpts)
It appears the destination of iPhone.com has become a recent casualty of war. In the last week, the registrant of the domain name has decided to pack it in as a direct destination for the company that owns it, a business that has nothing to do with the Cupertino crusader. Indeed, what would YOU do, if the domain name for your company began receiving an exhorbitant amount of non-converting visitors, only interested in someone else's product?
There is a veritable blitz of buzz occuring right now for Apple's upcoming iPhone product. As the most highly anticipated consumer device of all time, it spans almost all age groups, and exists as a product category nearly everyone uses. The domain name, registered to Mike Kovatch of the Internet Phone Company , has unfortunately gone somewhat incognito. It's WHOIS information has been hidden at some point in the last several months using the "Domains By Proxy" privacy service offered by GoDaddy, and the domain name no longer points to its website, but to a billboard, for which the company itself only holds the top banner.
Google Cache dated May 19th, still showing the original website
SLIDING FURTHER DOWN
It appears whoever currently owns the domain name "iPhone.com" has begun working even harder to monetize its traffic on the iPhone trademark. "Whoever" being preferred, as it is no longer clear if the name has changed hands behind closed doors. Whereas the previous design seemed modest and only tenuously related to the cell phone industry, the latest change on iPhone.com now boldy markets "cellphones that play music (click to buy)". So, there you have it. When your bandwidth bills come rolling in, just take the money and run! Mm. Can you say WIPO ? I knew you could.
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