NAUGHTY AMERICA going after affiliates!!
 

NAUGHTY AMERICA OFFERS AMNESTY TO CYBERSQUATTERS

Naughty America announced today a unique and one time amnesty program
for cybersquatters and typosquatters. Naughty America?s amnesty offer
is simple. Legal action will not be taken against cybersquatters and
typosquatters who transfer their infringing domain names to Naughty
America on or before April 2, 2010.

Naughty America owns the registered trademarks for ?Naughty America?
and numerous domain names incorporating the mark. Naughty America?s
long-standing ownership of the mark has not prevented infringers from
illegally profiting from Naughty America?s strong brand recognition
and goodwill by registering domain names that incorporate ?Naughty
America? or variations of the mark.

To participate in the amnesty program, anyone who has registered a
domain name that incorporates the trademark ?Naughty America? or
variations and misspellings of the mark needs to do the following:

1. Immediately stop any and all use of domain names that include the
trademark ?Naughty America? or variations and misspellings of ?Naughty
America;?

2. Transfer to Naughty America any and all rights in and to the
infringing domain names; and

3. Provide Naughty America with satisfactory proof that the domain
name has been transferred to LTI no later than April 2, 2010.


Good job Naughty! :1orglaugh

curt order please :)

Looks like they are putting the hammer down.

I thought the most interesting part of that email was the list of trademarks they say they own. NA for example (I guess not applicable can ever be used).

I've bolded some of the more interesting ones claimed as trademarks.

If these three in particular are actual trademarks, then I suspect they'd be easily challenged.

Not good I believe. Its like kicking affiliates ass.....

That's just crazy. What next? I can't use the word naughty in an ad I run for models......:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

So Naughty America wants to sue my friends hot mom for her american daydreams found in the diary of a milf. All I gotta say is "What's new?" Anyone have Ste 703 for the Phoenix conference?

nothing wrong with protecting your brand :2 cents:

Quoted for the truth :thumbsup

NA is top notch in my books.

Sorry but when someone says "NA" I don't think of Naughty America.

I agree on that one.

BTW I do think of Naughty America but that may be my perverted mind.

is this the same for affiliates that are using the site to promote just them? if thats the case i see this being nothing more than biting the hand that feeds you. they allowed it back when the affiliate registered the domain and spent their time and money to develop it, and they accepted traffic from the domain for who knows how long.

Most definitely. Reading between the lines, it seems like they're saying "Well, all mistypes is traffic we should be getting anyway because the user was trying to directly access our sites so you need to transfer those domains over pronto."

Next they will be dmca'ing sites and removing them from google for using the words Naughty, and later on the page America, or like stated 'NA' LOL.

Take your shit down now and save yourself and them the headaches. Or let some cheeky lawyer decide if your site is worth taking.

Looks like they'd prefer to do this marketing/branding thing on their own from here on in.

They are just trying to save money. It costs $1500 plus attorney fee's to register a domain name dispute with the National Arbitration Forum. The cost to the respondent is nothing unless they hire a lawyer, which shouldn't be needed if they know how to put a coherent few paragraphs together and aren't using the domains in bad faith.

Terms Naughty and America are generic terms, so this is a domain grab by NA nothing more. With that said I believe when you have a trademark you have to defend it if someone might be infringing or you risk losing the trademark. I don't know if that is 100% true but it was told to my when I was sued, and I won:-)

i gave up on them a long time ago. there once killer program has been a clusterfuck the last couple years.

100% agree

...:disgust

I bought a couple dot net versions of their domain names years ago and just forwarded them directly to their affiliate program. They never had the sense to register them at the time, so I thought I would do them a favour and do it for them.

Pretty piss poor tactics to do this to affiliates in my opinion, especially since I have been sending them sales every week since back when they were still called SocalCash.

And my sales were not made from these two domains, I made 99.9% of the sales on different domains that had some traffic. I doubt if these two domains made enough to break even over the reg fees.

Needless to say, I already emailed them to transfer the domains to them. I don't need the hassle. Just pisses me off.

edit: and none of my domains had to do with the words "naughty" or "america"

I don't blame you. We have given ourselves some self-inflicted wounds, but we are working on making Naughty America one of top programs again.

Feel free to contact me directly at eddie@naughtyamerica to discuss.

You should have an email from me regarding transferring two domains to you.

affiliate 4788

Naughty America provides our affiliates with free content to build traffic to their sites to make money. As a company, we have decided to protect our brands. Nothing more nothing less.

so you are trying to make your program best by snatching domains from your affiliates? The domains on which they have worked to make them top in SERPs?

If a affiliate is promoting your sites with the said domain name, what's wrong with that? You're ultimately getting the revenue and the affiliate is paid their part. Protecting your trade mark is a great idea, I agree, but you should fight with those who are promoting others with your trademarks.

In the current scenario, affiliates will be pissed off and looks like all you want is some more free traffic and this will ultimately result in more self-inflicted wounds! :2 cents:

I'm sorry If I sound harsh and I have nothing to do with Naughty America but It is not the right way to treat the affiliates. I've never heard of staff members being sued because they are working to make money for their company and themselves!

i got the same email some weeks back. contacted them immediatelly via icq, got a talk and everything is solved with no problems and no changes on both sides. it is only about how you use their trademark :2 cents:

id like to see this stand up in court :2 cents:

I emailed them too when they initially sent out the first email regarding this months ago. They said they would be in contact and then I never heard anything back until they sent out this broadcast email today.

Have fun wasting your $ to "protect your brand". Idiots

i got my sites approved after the first icq talk, i got message that everything is ok on my side, and today no new email received ...

Greed 8chars

http://www.linkpicture.com/out.php?i=45932_greed.jpg

Seriously, why?!?

Excellent!
I would wish other program owners would do the same.

Are the Trade marks World Wide or simply implemented for the USA as you may well know you can trade mark country by country or world wide...Just a thought :winkwink:

I'm sure it won't affect you, unless you're using their brand to push other sponsors. Could be wrong though.

I'm sure they are open for discussion with folks as well. I see nothing wrong with this. So what did you do? :1orglaugh

Note to self. Never do biz with Radicalsights.

I have no problem with a company looking to protect its trademarks, but to send this to every single affiliate is a little overzealous in my opinion. Its a handful of affiliates at best who are applicable and the tone of the email is rather aggressive in seeking any and all webmasters who might be infringing. Wouldn't it have been more professional to look at referral logs and send this email to those who are actually infringing? Either way, I'm not affected by this so it doesn't bother me all that much.
WG

Protect your brand? Bitch, pleeeeeaassseee!

Lets get to the real truth. You see perhaps 20 affiliates that are making a decent buck with sites like diaryofamilf.net. You think you will go in and take the domain and get all of the cash with no affiliate payout and it will stay at #1 in MSN or #2 in Yahoo... But it won't... They will drop all links. The domain will be worthless.

To show their appreciation back to you they will devote time to getting a generic domain back to #2 in Yahoo and send the traffic to a sponsor like Nasty Dollars or TCG or anywhere else but you.

Now if the affiliate was already doing that now, I can see how your'd be protecting yourself. It would make perfect sense. You are listening to your lawyers and not listening to common sense enough...

if they are using it to promote them why would they want to lose potentional sales

exactly....

i think only those who are using their name to promote other shit are angry now ...

it sure does:2 cents:

Well they make no mention that they are targetting those who are promoting other sponsors with their trademarks. I received the email and I certainly don't fall into that category.

Everytime i see a company do this it shocks me. Go after bag guys one by one , not en masse like this , it makes no sense , scares your own affiliates and degrades confidence.

Lets just say for example , i start a blog called naughtyamericablog.com this is a pretty clear case of trademark infringment, but if i am promoting naughtyamerica the only thing accomplished by taking the domain is loss of business. as others have pointed out , the one month influx of free traffic doesn't = the future loss of traffic. The webmaster won't promote the site because they don't own it anymore , links will get pulled and the affiliate will move onto programs who aren't so picky. So you get a bunch of worthless domains and a handfull of pissed off affiliates for a couple months of free traffic.


and you made kitty cry, good job :winkwink:
http://psctools.com/gfy/sadkitty.jpg

No application

Crazy people over there. Get off your ass, their business is hurt so they have
to come up with something crazy like this. Fuckem. Losers.

Just screams poor business right now, with leakage. haha

And it's the most unprofessional way to kick their affiliates ass. I mean, they could write without sounding Too paranoid. :2 cents:

i guess it depends on how delusional the person is who is trying to protect their brand, and if they think 1/2 the net is infringing on their generic name. we all know who those people are.

Nothing wrong with protecting yourself, but there is something wrong trying to steal from people by strong arming them and scaring them into giving up their domains that you know would never hold up in court but you try anyway just to see who hands it over to you. :disgust

right like if i own naughtycams or something, maybe they are hoping i would be retarded and think oh shit i better give them my domain because they might sue me. That approach, however has worked by low life's here.

99.999% of the rest of the population (not adult online world) thinks of Non Applicable when they see NA, so good luck with that one.

business must really be down for NA (:1orglaugh)