Champagne - Comite Interprofessional du vin de Champagne

The Parties
Comité Interprofessional du vin de Champagne v Stephen Terrance Jackson

The Citation
Nominet DRS No. 4479

The Tribunal
Decision of Appeal Panel, Nominet DRS.

The Context
Under the Nominet DRS (the equivalent dispute resolution procedure for .co.uk domains as, for example, that under ICANN in respect of generic TLDs), a complainant has to prove on the balance of probabilities that:

(a) the Complainant has rights in respect of a name or mark which is identical or similar to the domain name in question; and

(b) the domain name, in the hands of the Respondent is an Abusive Registration.

Abusive Registrations are defined as domain names which either were registered or acquired in the manner which at the time when the registration or acquisition took place took unfair advantage of or was unfairly detrimental to the Complainant's rights or has been used in a manner which took unfair advantage of or was unfairly detrimental to the Complainant's rights. The DRS lists a number of factors which may amount to evidence of abusive registrations.

The Decision
The Committee responsible for champagne growers complained about the registration by a UK individual of the domain name champagne.co.uk. The domain name was first registered in 1997. At the date of the Complaint, the domain name resolved to a web page consisting of a number of links to web sites providing advice relating to claim from personal injuries and accidents as well as to a personalised number plates site. There was some evidence that at some point the domain name had pointed to a site selling champagne and or that such a site was in development, including pointing for a time to the Majestic Wines website, a well-known UK wine retailer.

The Complainants made a Complaint under the DRS. The Complaint was rejected by the first Expert. Although she held that the Complainants did have relevant rights in the name, she did not consider that unfair advantage had been taken or the use had been unfairly detrimental to those rights either at the time of registration or through its subsequent use. She also found no evidence of a likelihood of confusion.

This decision was reversed by a 3 person appeal board. It found that the original Expert had been in error in not giving enough weight to the Complainants' rights in passing off as extended under the Chocosuisse case, and ignoring a number of other registrations made by the Respondent (which can amount to evidence of abusive registrations under the Nominet rules). The appeal board interestingly considered that "initial interest confusion" caused by use of the domain name was relevant in the passing off analysis.