Ford’s 2001 April court battle to stop an offensive domain name referencing General Motors and linking to its ford.com web site finally failed last month. United States District Judge Robert Cleland dismissed the claim that Ford’s trademark was being violated as it did not appear in the domain name but in the programming code.
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“Trademark law does not permit (Ford) to enjoin persons from linking to its homepage simply because it does not like the domain name or other content of the linking Web page.” said Cleland.
The judge’s ruling is available from the 2600 web site at http://www.2600.com/news/122201-files/ford-dec.html
The case was brought against the infamous 2600 ezine editor Eric Corley, also known by the hacker pseudonym “Emmanuel Goldstein”, over the domain “FuckGeneralMotors.com”. Ford had requested an injunction against 2600 Enterprises over the “hyperlink joke” and argued Corley’s business constituted a commercial use, preventing Ford from “fully exploiting the value of its mark.”
Prior to the ruling, Jay Cooney, a GM spokesman on legal matters, said “we absolutely and totally support Ford” in the lawsuit. “There’s no value to publishing a domain name laced with profanity. It’s not a social commentary. It’s just nothing,” Cooney said.
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By GlobalDataEric Grimm who argued the case for 2600 said, “This is a decisive victory and we are absolutely delighted. The court ruled consistently with the law and all precedent.”
In a statement on the 2600 web site Corley thanked his readers, Eric Grimm and the Electronic Frontier Foundation for their continued support.
The decision comes as a further blow to Ford’s web policing efforts following the failed attempt to sue Robert Lane and his web site BlueOvalNews.com in late 1999.
