On Media Rain’s Parade — Arbitrator Rains

Utah firm loses its frivolous UDRP complaint.

No surprise here. But still a sad, abusive story to note.

Media Rain, LLC has lost its arbitration proceedings in which it tried to obtain the domain name Rain.com.

The facts were quite damning. Rain.com was registered back in 1990, 18 years prior to Media Rain’s formation. Verio purchased the ISP that owned Rain.com in 1996.

But Media Rain, which uses the domain name MediaRain.com, wanted to get its hands on Rain.com. It inquired regarding purchasing the domain and Verio stated it wasn’t for sale. Not quite getting the message, Media Rain filed the UDRP. It had no chance of winning, but Verio suspects it filed it to try to slip a case through the cracks by naming Verio Operating, Inc. as the respondent instead of Verio, Inc. Verio Operating, Inc. has been wound up, and Verio suggested to the panel that Media Rain knew that and hoped it would not respond to the complaint.

In finding reverse domain name hijacking against Media Rain, the panel wrote:

At this point, instead of abandoning the matter, the Complainant initiated the present proceedings. Moreover, in spite of the pre-Complaint letters directed to Respondent, and clear WHOIS data showing Respondent as the domain name registrant, Complainant launched these Administrative Proceedings against Verio Operating, Inc., a firm shown by the evidence to have been wound up. Respondent postulated in relation to that action:

“It can only be assumed that Complainant intentionally undertook to conceal the name of the true domain name owner by naming Verio Operating, Inc. in hopes that its Complaint would slip through the Forum unopposed.”

This Panel struggles to find a more benign construction to Complainant’s actions to that suggested by Respondent.