Comment: Oh brother

"Making money hand over fist." Give me a break. I have some insight into how much money they're not making. How much demand is there for a Ron Paul shirt or a bumper sticker these days? Close to zilch. What is there left to "support?" The campaign is over.

If you want to read a serious treatment of the UDRP complaint, read the techdirt article

In response, Paul and his lawyers didn't just reject the request, they actually use it against them, misrepresenting the offer, the site and the entire history, in a ridiculously misleading attempt to show malicious intent on behalf of the folks who run the site -- who most people would consider some of Ron Paul's most important supporters.

The WIPO filing is really a guffaw-inducing piece of work. It doesn't just present one side of the story, it goes out of its way to imply things that are clearly untrue about those who run RonPaul.com -- suggesting that the whole effort was some sort of scam to extort money from Paul. A few quotes:

Respondents can demonstrate no legitimate purpose for registering domain names identical to Complainant's RON PAUL mark.

Other than, you know, building up a massive and widely envied internet grassroots support campaign for two high profile Presidential campaigns, as well as many of the key issues that Ron Paul (supposedly) believes in. Somehow, Paul's lawyers forget to mention that part.

There is no evidence that Respondents have used or in connection with a bona fide offering of goods or services.

Apparently trying to get Ron Paul elected is not something that Ron Paul considers a "bona fide" service.

They even imply that these guys only registered the domains to try to get Ron Paul to give them money for the domains. Apparently those 4.5 years of building up a massive and vocal grassroots online community supporting Ron Paul campaigns was just a ruse or something:

Under the UDRP, bad faith can be shown where the respondent registered the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling it to the trademark owner or to a competitor of that complainant, for consideration in excess of respondent's out-of-pocket costs.

I think it is sad that he took their support for six years without saying boo, and now he decides to call the cops on them.

I also talked to my lawyer about this, and as the Techdirt article implies, this is by no means a slam dunk for Ron, and he could very well lose.