Apple gains ownership of iPhone-related porn domain names

Posted:
in iPhone edited January 2014
Apple's bid to obtain a number of domain names from pornographic websites that include the "iPhone" name, including iphone4s.com, has proven successful.



As first reported by Domain Name Wire on Tuesday, a total of seven domain names have been turned over to Apple. The "WHOIS" record for the domains now shows MarkMonitor, a brand protection company, as the owner of the websites.



In addition to iphone4s.com, which carries the same name as Apple's latest handset, the other domains are iphonecamforce.com, iphonecam4s.com, iphoneporn4s.com, iphonesex4s.com, iphonexxforce.com, and porn4iphones.com.



Apple first filed a complaint with the World Intellectual Property Organization earlier this month. The complaint was quickly dropped, however, after the owner of the domains, an Israeli company, agreed to turn them over to Apple.



The iphone4s.com was originally registered in August of 2008, more than three years before Apple unveiled its iPhone 4S. The domain name for Apple's previous iPhone model, iphone4.com, is owned by Apple, but iphone3gs.com and iphone3g.com still forward to non-Apple sites.



The prompt resolution to the domain name dispute is different from a previous complaint filed by Apple over the ipods.com domain. That took a ruling from the WIPO in July to order the transfer of ipods.com to Apple.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 22
    So now we will have a walled garden of porn?
  • Reply 2 of 22
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JONOROM View Post


    So now we will have a walled garden of porn?



    iPorn? \
  • Reply 3 of 22
    That's the biggest milled aluminum-clad hard drive I've ever seen.



    "Yep and it just works"



    Sorry. Sorry. You let the filters down for just an instant and look what happens!!
  • Reply 4 of 22
    jd_in_sbjd_in_sb Posts: 1,600member
    I registered aple.com in 1996 and sold it for $20,000 in 2008 to some guy. I had never done anything with it, I just liked owning a 4-letter domain name which are hard to come by. The domain did get a TON of traffic, however. After buying it from me the guy put Apple-related ads on aple.com and I recently noticed that Apple now owns the domain. I probably would have lost it eventually so I am extremely fortunate to have that outcome. Ironically, the money I made will eventually all go to Apple, one insanely-great-gadget at a time!
  • Reply 5 of 22
    When I hear of corporations making moves like this, I often wonder if it would have been cheaper and faster to spend the money paid to lawyers to outright buy the product/problem in question from the rightful owner.



    I'd imagine that, like the previous commenter, that if AAPL rolled in with $20k cash or say 50 shares of AAPL the owners would have happily turned the domains over. Preface it with "you can take this, or we can take your domain", and they would be even more incentivized. Instead someone lost their domain and (I assume) got nothing, but lawyers get paid.





    And yes, I realize the corporation keeps the lawyers on the payroll and all that...but you can see my point. Why fight when you could probably just buy the domain from the person that legally attained it in the first place.
  • Reply 6 of 22
    jd_in_sbjd_in_sb Posts: 1,600member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by airnerd View Post


    Why fight when you could probably just buy the domain from the person that legally attained it in the first place.



    Because that will create a gold rush of people buying Apple-related domains, hoping to cash in, making Apple's domain problem exponentially worse.
  • Reply 7 of 22
    cameronjcameronj Posts: 2,357member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by airnerd View Post


    And yes, I realize the corporation keeps the lawyers on the payroll and all that...but you can see my point. Why fight when you could probably just buy the domain from the person that legally attained it in the first place.



    Ask yourself this - do you think no one at Apple was smart enough to do the math and determine which would be more costly? The answer to that should be self-evident, and thus the answer to your question should be as well.
  • Reply 8 of 22
    conradjoeconradjoe Posts: 1,887member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by airnerd View Post


    When I hear of corporations making moves like this, I often wonder if it would have been cheaper and faster to spend the money paid to lawyers to outright buy the product/problem in question from the rightful owner.




    I think that we hear of these situations so infrequently that they must do exactly that. Likely it varies with different registrants.



    Apple has likely scooped up thousands of the new .xxx domains to prevent them from getting into the hands of third parties.



    Every big corporation, or at least, every big one with a consumer presence needs to do it.
  • Reply 9 of 22
    estyleestyle Posts: 201member
    Unfortunately, www.iosgames.com is it still out there un-Appled.

    I was hoping for a site that was a catalogue of and review for site for iOS games, but no.



    It does not even contain anything iOS related, rather to "fun and sexy games for adults".

    They are not even digital games. :roll eyes:
  • Reply 10 of 22
    jd_in_sbjd_in_sb Posts: 1,600member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by estyle View Post


    Unfortunately, www.iosgames.com is it still out there un-Appled.

    I was hoping for a site that was a catalogue of and review for site for iOS games, but no.



    It does not even contain anything iOS related, rather to "fun and sexy games for adults".

    They are not even digital games. :roll eyes:



    Apple licenses the trademark "iOS" from Cisco which has owned the trademark for two decades. Seeing that iosgames.com was registered in 2009 the odds of the domain owners keeping it are slim to none.
  • Reply 11 of 22
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JONOROM View Post


    So now we will have a walled garden of porn?



    I assume you are kidding but for those that might believe you are serious ... I suspect gaining the DN doesn't mean gaining the web server's contents previously pointed to in the DNS. My guess would be iphone4s.com will probably be set to point to the Apple web site's iPhone section.
  • Reply 12 of 22
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jd_in_sb View Post


    I registered aple.com in 1996 and sold it for $20,000 in 2008 to some guy. I had never done anything with it, I just liked owning a 4-letter domain name which are hard to come by. The domain did get a TON of traffic, however. After buying it from me the guy put Apple-related ads on aple.com and I recently noticed that Apple now owns the domain. I probably would have lost it eventually so I am extremely fortunate to have that outcome. Ironically, the money I made will eventually all go to Apple, one insanely-great-gadget at a time!



    Clever you!
  • Reply 13 of 22
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ConradJoe View Post


    Apple has likely scooped up thousands of the new .xxx domains to prevent them from getting into the hands of third parties.



    I guess they are working on it. If you want to buy iPhoneSucks.xxx it is still available for $201.99 on GoDaddy.
  • Reply 14 of 22
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jd_in_sb View Post


    I registered aple.com in 1996 and sold it for $20,000 in 2008 to some guy. I had never done anything with it, I just liked owning a 4-letter domain name which are hard to come by. The domain did get a TON of traffic, however. After buying it from me the guy put Apple-related ads on aple.com and I recently noticed that Apple now owns the domain. I probably would have lost it eventually so I am extremely fortunate to have that outcome. Ironically, the money I made will eventually all go to Apple, one insanely-great-gadget at a time!



    Nice work.
  • Reply 15 of 22
    paxmanpaxman Posts: 4,729member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Rabbit_Coach View Post


    iPorn? \



    That's pretty much all you get with the iPhone. Unless your lover gets off on you playing with your iPhone during the act.
  • Reply 16 of 22
    conradjoeconradjoe Posts: 1,887member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by mstone View Post


    I guess they are working on it. If you want to buy iPhoneSucks.xxx it is still available for $201.99 on GoDaddy.



    I'd rather buy a Kindle Fire
  • Reply 17 of 22
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by cameronj View Post


    Ask yourself this - do you think no one at Apple was smart enough to do the math and determine which would be more costly? The answer to that should be self-evident, and thus the answer to your question should be as well.



    Ok, so Apple has never made a poor decision in their entire life? Please, bad decisions are made all the time by all companies and people.





    Just because Apple took one route, doesn't mean that they did in fact explore all viable options. Yes I'm sure they explored paying the guy off, but it still sucks when someone takes something you own. Maybe he was offered something that would give him a profit and he was greedy...I can admit that is a good possibility. Doesn't mean I don't have the "could this have been handled differently" thought when I read stories like this.
  • Reply 18 of 22
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jd_in_sb View Post


    Because that will create a gold rush of people buying Apple-related domains, hoping to cash in, making Apple's domain problem exponentially worse.



    There is plenty of case law already related to cybersquatting. If you just register the name and do nothing with it you have a hard time defending it. However, if you are running an active site, it becomes more difficult. I believe that Apple did pay for these sites. There is nothing to suggest that the owners turned them over out of the goodness of their hearts. But, you make an offer to buy AFTER you have submitted a law suit to strengthen your position.



    Apple might have won some of these cases, but I'll bet a few sites would have survived a legal battle, although the cost would have probably screwed them (sorry for the pun).
  • Reply 19 of 22
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by airnerd View Post


    Why fight when you could probably just buy the domain from the person that legally attained it in the first place.



    Are cyber-squatters still around?
  • Reply 20 of 22
    hmmhmm Posts: 3,405member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Rabbit_Coach View Post


    iPorn? \



    I'm not the one that came up with this, but "fap store" would be funnier than iPorn.
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