A friend of mine, Marc Rasmussen, lost his domain name recently. The members of the Sarasota MLS board took it upon themselves to make sure he no longer has rights to his domain of several years, TheSarasotaMLS.com because the domain has "MLS" within the name. Oh, and let's not forget that Marc's site was and is beating all of the board member's sites, plus the association's site for the search phrase "sarasota mls." But that surely wasn't at issue, right? Marc won his case with the NAR, but lost his domain with ICANN. You can read the details here.
From the NAR's mission statement: "The core purpose of the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® is to help its members become more profitable and successful." Where's the NAR now?
Next up is major league soccer (MLS). I understand the NAR and the Sarasota MLS are going after them. Oh crap, I forgot, only members of the NAR are prohibited from using "mls" in their domain name. Anyone else can!
Related: Marc Rasmussen v. Sarasota Association of Realtors, Inc. | Inman News Response | Resource
Oh, did ya see this? The SAR MLS hokie pokie!
Follow this on Bloodhound, as well!
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