Talks the Talk, Fails to Walk The Walk — UDRP complainant

Walk the Walk Worldwide fails in domain name dispute.

In April I wrote regarding how a charity had filed a UDRP against Frank Schilling for the domain name WalkTheWalk.com.

Walk the Walk Worldwide, which operates WalkTheWalk.org, raises money for breast cancer research by organizing women to walk marathons in bras.

It sounds like a great approach to raising money and awareness. Unfortunately, the charity took a not-so-great approach to trying to get the WalkTheWalk.com domain name.

It started using WalkTheWalk.org in 1999. It finally inquired regarding WalkTheWalk.com in 2012, and apparently didn’t like the $56,000 price tag. That led to the UDRP filing.

Walk the Walk argued that the use of WalktheWalk.com to show pay-per-click links related to walking and exercise was an attempt to trade on the good will the charity has developed. It also argued that “while the phrase “You can talk the talk, but can you walk the walk?” is in general usage, the shorter phrase “walk the walk” is not generic.

The panel believed otherwise, and found against the charity.

The charity made an additional assertion that “it understands that the Respondent’s website previously contained links to pornography, although these now appear to have been removed.”

I’m not sure how you come to “understand” that a site contained links to pornography. Did you see them or not? I looked at historical screenshots for the site and can’t find any suggestions that this was true, nor did the complainant apparently submit any evidence. The respondent denied it, as well.

Schilling was represented by John Berryhill.