Did you think the domain names wars were over? Forget it. Yahoo! (Nasdaq:YHOO) is suing NetGames, an online betting company owned by two Israelis, who decided to call their basketball betting site Yahoops. The name quickly aroused the ire of the US company.
The Israelis, Shai and Ido Raviv, founded the site in four languages. It is possible to bet on almost anything, including Nasdaq, basketball and football. The company's servers are based in the Central American republic of Belize, sandwiched between Guatemala and Mexico.
"We decided to open a basketball betting site and bought the domain name Yahoops from a private individual named Mark Green two years ago for $20,000," says Shai Raviv. "We immediately launched a massive advertising campaign about the new site. Naturally Yahoo! noticed and claimed the domain should have been theirs."
"Globes": There is logic behind their claim, since Yahoops sounds like one of their services.
Raviv: "True, but any English speaker knows the word 'hoops' has two meanings. One means the rim of the basket, and the other, in slang, means betting on basketball. I don't think there is any violation. Moreover, if I were CEO of Yahoo!, and I didn't own the Yahoops domain name, I'd fire somebody. I've no doubt they were infuriated when they saw our site. Even if Yahoo! were to offer me $1 million for the domain name, I wouldn't sell to them. At one point, they tried buy the domain name, but nothing came of it.
"We hired attorneys in the US and Israel, and if we lose the arbitration, we'll fight to the end. The domain name is fantastic; the application is a killer; and I won't surrender. It's a domain name that isn't forgotten. I’m now demanding $5 million from Yahoo! If they want to pay, they'll have the domain name that same day. You’d think they coined the name Yahoo!, which has used been in cartoons for 20 years. They did excellent branding, but you can't grab the entire world."
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on June 16, 2002