Gordon Sumner, p/k/a Sting v Michael Urvan was the 2000 dispute before

World Intellectual Property Organization The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO; french: link=no, Organisation mondiale de la propriété intellectuelle (OMPI)) is one of the list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, 15 specialized agencies of the United Nation ...

between

Sting Sting may refer to: * Stinger or sting, a structure of an animal to inject venom, or the injury produced by a stinger * Irritating hairs or prickles of a stinging plant, or the plant itself Fictional characters and entities * Sting (Middle-eart ...

, a prominent English musician and actor, and Michael Urvan, an American gamer, about ownership rights on the

domain name A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...

"sting.com". The domain name was registered in 1995 by Urvan, who used the monikers "Stingray" and "Sting", to support his gaming activities. Urvan was the first individual to successfully defend against a domain name dispute brought against an individual by a celebrity.

Origins of sting.com

The domain name 'sting.com' was registered to Michael Urvan on July 25, 1995, as an email domain, for the purpose of supporting his gaming, and later for the gaming clan '' globally ranked on TheCLQ.com. Urvan used the moniker '=Sting=' for playing in online games and competitive matches. Urvan originally used the name Stingray as an alias while BBSing in the mid 1980s, borrowed from a 1985 TV series of the same name. While chatting, people tended to abbreviate the name 'Stingray' and only type 'Sting'. It is because of this habit, that during the early 1990s he began using the moniker 'Sting' for pre-

WWW The World Wide Web (WWW), commonly known as the Web, is an information system enabling documents and other web resources to be accessed over the Internet. Documents and downloadable media are made available to the network through web se ...

Internet

MUD A MUD (; originally multi-user dungeon, with later variants multi-user dimension and multi-user domain) is a Multiplayer video game, multiplayer Time-keeping systems in games#Real-time, real-time virtual world, usually Text-based game, text-bas ...

games and

BBS BBS may refer to: Ammunition * BBs, BB gun metal bullets * BBs, airsoft gun plastic pellets Computing and gaming * Bulletin board system, a computer server users dial into via dial-up or telnet; precursor to the Internet * BIOS Boot Specificat ...

signons as illustrated in the ICANN Domain Name Dispute response text. Urvan continued to use this moniker throughout the 1990s but has since changed his gaming moniker, post dispute.

UDRP domain name dispute

On July 13, 2000, attorneys for the English musician and actor

(born Gordon Sumner) filed a complaint against Urvan for the domain name 'sting.com' via the

ICANN The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) is an American multistakeholder group and nonprofit organization responsible for coordinating the maintenance and procedures of several databases related to the namespaces ...

Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy The Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP) is a process established by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) for the resolution of disputes regarding the registration of internet domain names. The UDRP curren ...

, and the case was sent before

for arbitration. On July 11, 2000, Dr. Andrew F. Christie was appointed to be the sole panelist by WIPO for the case. On July 19, 2000, after reviewing the complaint submitted by attorneys on the behalf of Sting, and after reviewing the response provided by Urvan, the case was decided in favor of Urvan. The panel's decision was made based on several factors: that 'sting' was a common dictionary word, and that Urvan was using the name in

good faith In human interactions, good faith ( la, bona fides) is a sincere intention to be fair, open, and honest, regardless of the outcome of the interaction. Some Latin phrases have lost their literal meaning over centuries, but that is not the case ...

. "Urvan's lawyers argued that sting is a common English word, Sumner had not registered it as a trademark and Urvan was legitimately using it, not holding it to ransom. The WIPO panel agreed." The case drew international attention for being the first major defeat of a celebrity in a domain name dispute. The domain name now hosts Sting's website.

References

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Origins of sting.com

UDRP domain name dispute

References

External links