Activision Files Complaint Over ModernWarfare3.com ... Nobody is Surprised

[Shawn Zipay]

It was really just a matter of time before it happened, but Activision has finally filed a complaint over ModernWarfare3.com and how it had at one point redirected to the Battlefield 3 website. It is now back to its old format, which apparently is a website dedicated to how much the Call of Duty series, namely the Modern Warfare titles, suck.

The complaint was filed with the National Arbitration Forum. Activision ponied up $2,600 for the complaint stating that the owner of ModernWarfare3.com has "no right or legitimate interest to the name." I'm not too up on the whole process of domain name disputes, but the next step is for the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) to take place and see who has the "right" to own the domain in this case.

The full complaint from Activision, all 11-pages of it in PDF form, can be found right here. There's a lot of legal talk there, but if that sort of thing is your bag, then have at it.

[CptainCrunch]

Re: Activision Files Complaint Over ModernWarfare3.com ... Nobody is Surprised

I dont know how fast UDRP responds to things like this, but if its as fast as other legal systems and such, by the time this gets all sorted out, both games could be released.

Crunch

[Stryker]

Can they really get a site shut down just because of that...censorship much?

[Anarchy1]

They shouldn't be able to, but Activision probably has a bigger legal team.

[CptainCrunch]

Re: Activision Files Complaint Over ModernWarfare3.com ... Nobody is Surprised

Because of all the people back in the 90s squating on names and trying to sell them to people as a ransom, US laws make it pretty easy to "claim" a legit name.

Crunch

[Lordsethonan]

Still their own damn fault; they could have secured the domain name and all related sites back in march-april when MW3 got "leaked".Of course since it's all a money thing and Kotick is not against sueing people for his screwups, the guy holding the site will be fined a lot of money and Acti will claim a moral victory; when they could have saved all the trouble and name calling by actually securing the domain name before hand, precisely to avoid this kind of thing.You would think with the millions of dollars in revenue, they could afford to squat on a domain name for a couple of years.

[K-16]

Maybe they already spent their budget on reserving Secret, Advanced, Future, and Space Warfare.

[Vreki]

Re: Activision Files Complaint Over ModernWarfare3.com ... Nobody is Surprised

Can they really get a site shut down just because of that...censorship much?

You can call your site whatever you like, but the actual domain name is administered by a third party.
And that is a good thing for us users, it is very annoying when you search for something specific and the first page of results is nothing by name-squatters and other leeches.
This is ultimately in on our best interest.

Now this is funny because it happened to someone we dislike, but EA was clearly in the wrong.

[Lordsethonan]

Yet this someone we dislike can't argue they don't know better, and that they didn't think it could happen; or that they don't have the money to secure a url before hand.They can't act the victim because we knew since Modern Warfare sold like pancakes that there would be as many sequels as Activision could churn out before sucking the well dry, they even went on to lenghts to make public their intention to milk the franchise for all its worth.so even if you don't dislike Acti; it's hard to root for them because with a franchise making billions it's not rocket science to secure assets like a url and domain name before hand, and release them in the case the franchise fell through.Maybe they didn't want another problem like with guitar hero where they reserved domains and trademarks for drum hero, band hero, hapsichord hero, guitar villain and a lot of other downright stupid trademarks; but again it was their fault for making substandard product and flooding the market with it.At the peak of the fake plastic rock craze; kotick famously said, that if it were up to him, he'd drive the price on the plastic peripherals even more as they had an intrinsec higher value because of all the fun you got with them and some similar pearls of wisdom that ultimately fed the audience up.

[Shawn Zipay]

Re: Activision Files Complaint Over ModernWarfare3.com ... Nobody is Surprised

You can call your site whatever you like, but the actual domain name is administered by a third party.
And that is a good thing for us users, it is very annoying when you search for something specific and the first page of results is nothing by name-squatters and other leeches.
This is ultimately in on our best interest.

Now this is funny because it happened to someone we dislike, but EA was clearly in the wrong.

EA is in the wrong? ... EA doesn't own the site. Read the OP, go to the URL, or look at the PDF complaint.

[Vreki]

Re: Activision Files Complaint Over ModernWarfare3.com ... Nobody is Surprised

EA is in the wrong? ... EA doesn't own the site. Read the OP, go to the URL, or look at the PDF complaint.

Oh, I thought EA was behind since I pointed at the BF3 site for a while.
But I was wondering how a company known for its hordes of lawyers could do somethng that was obviously a lost cause.

It makes much more sense if it was just one guy give Activision the finger.

[Mavrik347]

Awww diddums, ickle Activision spat it's dummy out. Blesss. I hope they lose. They don't really have a legal leg to stand on.