Trademark Case to Guy Named TiVo — TiVo Loses

TiVo, meet TiVo.

DVR firm TiVo certainly has a trademark to the term “TiVo”, but it may have found its match: a band member who goes by the nickname “Tivo”.

Rocker Majan Fernandez Primitivo goes by the stage name “Tivo” for his acts, taking the last four letters of his last name. He registered Tivo.es to promote himself.

That didn’t sit well with the DVR maker, who filed a complaint with the World Intellectual Property Organization to get the domain name.

But the arbitrator balked at the claims. Following all, Primitivo was using the domain name and certainly has a legitimate interest in it. He wasn’t trying to profit from the firm TiVo. It follows that he didn’t register it in bad faith, either.

If the TV maker wants to get its hands on TiVo.es, it might need to license Primitivo’s content for its services…and ask for the domain as part of the deal.