Welcome to all our visitors in the .gov and .mil domains!


[UPDATE: 12.26.02]
How much does Thomas and Betts try to hit reznor::dot::com ?
A *lot* !  We can now see every attempt they have made, and when
they have attempted to make it.  Clicky clicky for details...

[UPDATE: 09.14.01]
Should we be at all concerned that a company known as MarkWatch 
(http://www.markwatch.com/) is checking our content?
Is someone up to something?  Can't I just be left alone?

No, apparently not.  It appears that given the recent attempts by Thomas 
and Betts to view this site (long since blocked), combined with MarkWatch 
and the additional factor of contracting and construction companies hitting 
www.reznor.com lately, this would appear to be a concerted effort to build 
a demonstrative case against myself and my ownership of this domain.

I registered this domain years ago.  It's a personal site.

It's *my* personal site.

I don't compete with certain corporations; I'm not in the same industry.
Legally, trademarks and copyrights dont apply.
Actually, being a personal site, this domain technically isn't in any
industry.

This site exists as an outlet for whatever happens to be on mind, whatever
I feel like throwing out of my head and into some form recognizable to others.
It functions as a repository for files useful to individuals in the 
Information Security field.  I mirror and link to several applications of 
use.  In the past reznor.com has served as the official West Coast Mirror
for l0phtcrack (prior to the 3.x revision, technically released by @stake).  
I donate my time, my drive space, and my bandwidth to the greater good of 
the security community.  I function professionally as a security engineer 
and have assisted in security application development and contributed to open 
source projects, and have spoken and lectured on information security, 
all pro bono.

And yet some (note: not naming names) feel the need to fuck with me and my 
domain regardless.

[UPDATE]
As is typical, I had My Attorney contact Their Attorney and matters 
were tended to.  As it stands right now, My Domain is still My Domain.

The following text is something I wrote up which I sent to Slashdot, as 
well as several other news sites in an effort to generate as much awareness of
this situation as is possible.

I leave this up as a flag to the world representing yet another facet of
The Evil That Men Do.  

We would like to thank in particular Slashdot, Tom Dell, Matt Dabrowski, and 
of course JG!  Additionally, a *huge* Thank You to each and every person that 
has sent in their support since this began.  The ongoing encouragement is 
amazing and incredibly positive!

Don't forget to hit /support.html once inside if you care to read more about
this in depth.

-aj.

Begin:

A few years ago I registered a vanity domain, reznor.com, with the
intent of eventually putting online an excessively vain website.  The
site eventually came online a few months ago, and up until that point I
had an email forward based on the domain.

www.reznor.com is something of a hobby for me, something that as the
skeleton present shows, will eventually grow to include music and movie
reviews, hardware and software reviews and resources, a few technical
tidbits, and my own, personal self-gratifying rhetoric.  Thing were fine
for a few months.  I was then contacted through email by a
representative of Thomas & Betts Corporation.  Thomas & Betts apparently
owns, or has control of the Reznor company which makes heating and
ventillation units.  The representative, in his email, asked if I would
be willing to part with my domain name, and for what price.  I politely
(yes, politely, far from my usual standard) declined, and stated that I
was obviously rather attached to the name and was of the mindset that I
would not part with it.  He thanked me, suggested possibly exchanging
links or something of the sort, which was later withdrawn, apparently by
a superior.  Approximately two weeks ago I even received email from
someone in Canada asking if his unit conformed to a certain standard. 
This mail I forwarded off to the Thomas & Betts representative who had
initially contacted me, and I notified the sender that I had forwarded
his mail to someone in the appropriate organization that could help him.

Thomas & Betts "through its Reznor business unit markets and sells
various products under its registered trademark REZNOR."  How do I know
this?  Simple.  That statement is taken from a piece of correspondence
dated September 22, 1999, which I received from Hoffman & Baron, LLP. 
The "firm represents Thomas & Betts Corporation with regard to certain
Intellectual Property matters."  Despite my civil attitude towards
Thomas & Betts, and my courtesy of sending misdirected email
correspondence to them, they now see fit to legally try to separate me
from my domain name.  Given that I had registered the name 3 years ago,
and that "Thomas & Betts has used REZNOR in commerce since at least
early 1949", by my calculations, they had ample time to register the
name prior to me.

While they do claim that "Depending upon the extent and nature of the
use of this domain name, such may be an infringement of Thomas & Betts' 
rights and may cause dilution of its mark.  A number of consumers
looking for products sold under the REZNOR trademark have incorrectly
come upon your website.  Furthermore, your use of the term REZNOR has
the tendency to disparage the goodwill established in Thomas & Betts
registered trademark."  Phew, that's quite a mouthful, and to be talking
out both sides of the mouth at once, too!  To take each item in order:
        The extent and nature of the use of my domain name is about as
far fromthe heating and airconditioning community as one could hope to be.

        The mark is not being diluted; I am not in the same industry, nor do I
purport to be, nor do I or my site purport or imply any relation to the
industry, or the company of Thomas & Betts.

        Putting "reznor" into a search engine may indeed yield hits to
my site, but generate thousands of more hits for fan sites for the industrial
band Nine Inch Nails, who's frontman, Trent Reznor, is  both a teen idol
and a media icon.

In my own opinion, any goodwill Thomas & Betts has established is
diluted by the thuglike tactics displayed in the letter from their
attorneys, Hoffmann & Baron, LLP.

To also question their goodwill further, they state "Thomas & Betts is
also the registered owner of various domain names including the term
REZNOR."  First, this doesn't really matter for much of anything.  The
implication is there that if I had registered more domains with "reznor"
in the name, I would have more rights to the name than them?  The fun
part:

Registrant:
Thomas & Betts (REZNORSUCKS-DOM)
   8155 T&B Boulevard
   Memphis, TN 38125
   US

   Domain Name: REZNORSUCKS.COM

   Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
      harley, phil  (PH3549)  phil.harley@TNB.COM
      901.252.5167 (FAX) 901.252.1301
   Billing Contact:
      Shaeffer, Bob  (BS7279)  bob_shaeffer@TNB.COM
      901.252.2193 (FAX) 901.252.1301

   Record last updated on 08-Sep-99.
   Record created on 08-Sep-99.
   Database last updated on 4-Oct-99 09:09:01 EDT.

   Domain servers in listed order:

   TNBDNS1A.TNB.COM             208.5.87.110
   TNBDNS1B.TNB.COM             208.5.87.111

Thomas & Betts registered "reznorsucks.com" on Septermber 8th, 1999. 
Approximately two weeks prior to their attorneys writing the letter
which has spurred me to write this notice now.  It would seem that they
do not have too much faith in their own goodwill, such as attempting to
bully me out of my domain name, that they went so far as to register a
name derogatory to their own trademark, for fear that I take it.  That,
or they think so little of their own reputation (the one they worried
about me damaging) that they had to register "reznorsucks.com" to put up
a site dedicated to it.  If they do not put a site up on
"reznorsucks.com", one can only assume they are cybersquatting on a
domain name.

To continue with the body of the notice I received, "Accordingly, in
view of Thomas & Betts' well established rights in the registered
trademark REZNOR, we ask that you take steps to relinquish the domain
name REZNOR.COM and assign such name to Thomas & Betts Corporation."

"Further, under the rules of NSI's domain dispute policy, an owner of a
federally registered trademark may take steps to prevent continued use
of the domain name which, as in this case, is identical to a prior
registered trademark."

We can assume that Hoffman & Baron, LLP may not be familiar with the
recent judgement against Hasbro, makes of the popular "Clue" boardgame,
which allowed a small ISP which uses "clue.com" to continue usage and
ownership of the name.  They may also be unfamiliar with the old,
precedent setting case of Mark Newton, owner of "newton.com", which
developed from Apple wanting "newton.com" as a site for their then new
and popular PDA, the Apple Newton.  The ruling set at the time was that
despite the trademark Apple had on "newton", Mark was there first, and
"newton" being his identity, was allowed to keep the domain.

It's a shame and a crime that we have become a Land of Litigation, and
that once again we see a display of The Big Guys trying to heave their
monetary-backed muscle around on The Little Guy.  At this juncture, I am
not sure what direction things are going to take, but I sincerely hope
to retain my site name, not give in, and stand up for what I beleive
in.  Any and all support from fellow netizens is greatly appreciated.  I
can be reached at aj@reznor.com.

Yours in the ether,

Aj Effin ReznoR



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Copyright © 1999 Aj Effin ReznoR, reznor::dot::com.  All rights reserved.