Aimster loses battle with AOL
  05/24/2001 4:23:44 AM MDT Albuquerque, Nm
  By Dustin D. Brand; Owner AMO

Aimster creator Johnny Deep argued the aim in AIMster had nothing to do with AOL; HA AOL said...   Aimster founder Johnny Deep has said publicly that the name of his service derives from the nickname for Aimee - supposedly the woman pictured on the site's home page. Where was Aimee in this arbitration I say? You mean, Johnny you didn't bring your evidence to the arbitration? As Judge Judy would say, "Come on...do I have a Stupid printed on my forehead?".

  Despite the fact that Aimster taps into both AOL Instant Messenger and also Napster, ahem, thus AIMster, Johnny stuck with his guns saying it's derived from Aimee, not AIM. Got it? What a jackass.

  The National Arbitration Forum didn't buy it. Arbitrators ruled 2-to-1 that Aimster was essentially cyber-squatting, using AOL's registered trademark to imply a connection between the services and "lure" unsuspecting users to the site, according to Computer User's Steven Bonisteel. The ruling requires Deep to give up the Aimster.com domain name, along with a few others, even though the dissenting arbitrator, G. Gervaise Davis, pointed out that AOL didn't register AIM as a trademark until seven months after Aimster.com was registered. Deep called the decision "a horrendous error."

  The Register's Kieren McCarthy offered the best analysis of the case, explaining why AOL went to the National Arbitration Forum to settle the matter, rather than to the World Intellectual Property Organization, where it usually goes. McCarthy detailed a similar case in which a developer used an AOL trademark in part of a domain (icqplus.org) because it offered a product that depended on AOL's product. WIPO ruled against AOL in that case, so in this similar case, "AOL went to NAF instead." It really pays to shop around.

  I'm getting sick and tired of reporting on this crap. Stealing is stealing, and calling an orange an apple doesn't make the orange an apple, when will people realize this?

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