DRS Advice - Complicated Or Straight Forward

[retired_member6]

Alright,

I have a domain name MillwallOnline.co.uk bought in 1999, I got asked to leave rivals.net, sacked take it how you want, my site, my users, my logo, my content, work for myself... the other week after almost eight years of working for the **** company. Anyway, the company is so bitter they have registered originalmillwallonline.co.uk - can I drs them do you think?

I had a deal with them back in 1999, some of the clauses they've sent me are as follows, however obviously, apart from the fact they've stolen my content, restricted access to my content by IP ban, refusing to pay my last installment and also refusing to give me a copy of almost eight years work of which I hold the copyright to, they're now going to trade under a variation of my trading name.

3.1 In consideration of the sums payable to you under this agreement you hereby grant us for the duration of this Agreement an irrevocable,exclusive, worldwide licence, within the right to assign or sub-licenseto any third party, to use, distribute, display, modify, adapt, edit,
compile, copy, cache, transmit, promote or otherwise exploit your
content and your trade names and trade marks on the Internet (including
the Site) or in an other form.

3.2 Upon termination of this Agreement for whatever reason the licence
in 3.1 will continue in perpetuity but it will become non-exclusive as
of the date of termination.

The only reason they're doing this is to wind me up and because they're bitter at one of their top ten sites leaving. Do you think I would be able to DRS them and furthermore, do you think I could win giving the basis of the clauses above. Also the other glaringly obvious face, is they're not the original Millwall Online, I am.

Thanks for any advice, I really do have to try to laugh at them but it is all starting to get under my skin a little, not only have they stolen my website content, refusing to pay up, now they've done this. I'd be interested in hearing your view on them holding my content as hosts and refusing to give me a copy back as well, a copy of content I hold copyright too, my own bleeding work.

Cheers
Lee

 

[Edwin]

Reading only that quote, without the rest of the contract - and remember that I-am-not-a-lawyer - it sounds as if what they've done is fine under the law. It may not be nice but they're within the rights you agreed to.

Of course, there is the issue of withholding your payment, taking your content etc. but these are SEPARATE issues (and not covered by the quoted contract extract, although they might be by other sections of the same contract) and therefore IMO need to be handled as such.

At the end of the day, the safest thing for you might be to either

A) Do nothing

or

B) Engage a lawyer

I would never try to fight something of that degree of complexity without professional representation.

 

[retired_member6]

Reading only that quote, without the rest of the contract - and remember that I-am-not-a-lawyer - it sounds as if what they've done is fine under the law. It may not be nice but they're within the rights you agreed to.

Of course, there is the issue of withholding your payment, taking your content etc. but these are SEPARATE issues (and not covered by the quoted contract extract, although they might be by other sections of the same contract) and therefore IMO need to be handled as such.

At the end of the day, the safest thing for you might be to either

A) Do nothing

or

B) Engage a lawyer

I would never try to fight something of that degree of complexity without professional representation.

I am the original millwall online though... there must be some sort of law stating fair use of copyright must be within a legal remit, i.e. factual

Ah well, bitter is the word i'll use for them, no decent millwall fan will ever use that site and as long as they trade under originalmillwallonline.co.uk then they're advertising my site, I suppose I should only laugh.

 

[GWing]

Lee,

First thing I would do is if someone sent me to a website called originalmillwallonline.co.uk, is I would look what was at millwallonline.co.uk

at a second glance it may actually be free publicity. Email them back and say thanks for the free publicity, that will really wind them up.

I take it you can get your content back with a proxy ip?

GW

 

[domainking]

millwall

Hi lee

Just be very carefull what your doing mate Court cases are very costly and do not go down that road just get on with building your site to be a top site and the rest will do its job

 

[monaghan]

Why not do a bit of SEO work so that your site ranks higher than them for "originalmillwallonline"

 

[retired_member6]

Why not do a bit of SEO work so that your site ranks higher than them for "originalmillwallonline"

I probably will it's only been two weeks, it's just the content, trade name and non payment was a bit of an issue.

 

[Beasty]

I probably will it's only been two weeks, it's just the content, trade name and non payment was a bit of an issue.

In answer to the original question - I'd say from what you have posted that it's complicated and not straightforward. I would also tend to agree with the advice on litigation and maybe focusing on SEO - but obviously that's subject to not having seen all the facts.