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The Internet

TypoSquating == CyberSquating 164

Posted by CmdrTaco from the gotta-wonder-about-that dept.
Lostman writes "ZDNet has an article here that details how WIPO ordered a "typosquater" of altavista.com to give up 43 domain names that might confuse and mislead people. The rationale for this is that these sites were not registered in good faith." Typo sites are odd: I'm cool with most of them (parodies or ones that simply have an ad and a redirector to the real deal) but some really piss me off... like the Slashdot typo sites that frame slashdot with extra banner ads. They do confuse and mislead people: the flame mail in my inbox over the years proves it. I've been called an awful lot of nasty things over a few transposed letters.
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TypoSquating == CyberSquating

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  • Deal With it CmdrTaco! (Score:4)

    by SetupWeasel ( 54062 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:50PM (#663888) Homepage
    What you are talking about is infringement on copyright laws, and this has nothing to do with typosquatting. If someone at www.ed.com did the same you'd still be upset.

    Cybersquatting is a bunch of bull. Domain names ate like real estate, and if your company is too slow to get the best piece of that real estate, tough shit. Pay the price if it means so much to you. It is amazing how many so-called capitalist ventures go crying to the government when things dont go their way.

    I say, you snooze, you LOSE.
  • Though personallyi don't believe real world trademarks and such should apply to the internet especially in terms of the name services system i can find NOTHING wrong with typosquatting. Why should these company's be allowed to have control over names that they DO NOT own, if they don't registed the typoed domain names themselves (and for the amount some people pay for domain names i can't see why they dont try to atleast) then they have no ownership over them and shouldn't be able to force people to give them up. I really hope that ICANN takes a much less favourable stance towards these companies that it's predecessors have in the past. The domain name system works on a first-come-first-server and should continue to do so without the help of our good laywer friends who are making some big bucks on the whole "cybersquatting" issue.
  • Technically if they really fought this hard they could win. People that use names like pansosonic and stuff like that are still legal even though they use a name trying to fool the customer into thinking that they are panasonic.

    Although the recent ruling about domains not being property could some how affect this, I don't believe that this should be any different, even if they did register it in bad faith it is their own to use how they see fit. If a company wanted to fight this they would have to some how prove that by registering their trademark name they somehow register all others that are remotely similar.

    Maybe it is just me (I highly doubt it), but I say appeal damnit!
  • And, the domain holder using NameZero is legally bound by the user agreement to not use code to break the frame himself in their NameZero control setup. That's what some people don't seem to grok and assume that if the intent was good that the domain holder would have removed the frame etc etc...

    Slashdot and Taco aren't users of NameZero and they can do whatever they want with their own site. Maybe this causes conflict with business partners or the web code, but just how isn't readily apparent to me.

    The domain is pointing directly at Slashdot.org. The user (NameZero actually owns the domain) cannot break out of the frames without pointing it at another site, risking the /. effect and NameZero's wrath. From a legal standpoint, there's nothing the user can do to remove the frame. He is contractually obligated not to do so. Slashdot is not.

    He should get MORE email until he understands what his options are, and what few options anyone else has. The only possible solution, one that Taco doesn't seem to be taking advantage of, is to politely or forcifully ask NameZero to stop hosting the site and/or hand over the domain. The user really has no control over it.

    Taco should stop attributing this banner to some form of malice, and pretending like someone is out to get Slashdot.

    --
  • if it's his site, doesn't he determine what banners, in any are placed there?!?!?!
  • a long time ago when i first found slashdot i was all "whoa..cool" then the next time i tried to go i went to slashdot.com and there was nothing there and i was all "...where'd it go?" ...that continued for like a week til i went to slashdot.org again... tuck and roll gramma tuck and roll!
  • Exactly how it happened for me... =)

  • He said more than that (Score:3)

    by Frac ( 27516 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @07:49PM (#663895)
    That's not the only thing he said:

    I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which frames Slashdot with a 2nd banner ad. Now I don't care ... but this fools about 1 person every 2-3 days, and they flame me for selling out and doing something so horrible as framing Slashdot for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that frame the site are pretty slimey, but as long as the typo site provides a link to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em.

    My god did you read that? Taco doesn't care for selling out slashdot! Look at how much you can infer from his quote!

  • No one bid on those, lets buy under 100 (for all of them of course!)

  • Abuse the Lusers (Score:3)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @08:01PM (#663897) Homepage Journal
    Hate mail over typos is a prime opportunity to abuse the lusers which you are (I'm assuming) just frittering away. First, you need an ultra condescending form letter. Start off with something along the lines of, "Dear Sir, You're an idiot." Lay the abuse on as thick as you can stand it. Ripe topics of discussion include the sender's parentage, his place of origin, his IQ level relative to you, the size of his penis, and what he can do with his modem. Finish up by banning him from using the site for a year, A La Soup Nazi.

    Once you realize that lusers are a renewable resource (There are always more of them on hand than you know what to do with) you can start burning through them like the rest of us abusive elitist crowd who go out of our ways to poke fun at the newbies.

  • Hmm. I think there's reason to believe the person that registered 'salshdot.org' did so in good faith.

    If you follow that link, you'll see that the ad is presented by Namezero. Namezero will register a domain for you for free, but place their little ad frame on it. The main frame's contents aren't ever hosted on Namezero's servers, even. Namezero allows you to enter a URL for your main document, and that's it.

    So, I wouldn't be surprised of some guy just kept typing 'salshdot.org' instead of 'slashdot.org', and decided to get it using Namezero to save himself some hassle.

    Just a thought! :)

  • Quick Robin! To the BUTT-MOBILE!
  • How about "sound like" ?

    I have a website ikhlas.com [ikhlas.com], but several week before. there are one radio
    advertisement sound like "ikhlas.com" but its not clear whether 'ikras.com' or
    'igras.com' . Till now i dont know wthat is the URL , hehehhe

    but anyway, lot of people try to enter my website.
    i will be sued for website which is sound like the others?

  • How about doing something about this? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It looks like the majority of those typoed domain names are available on ebay [ebay.com]. It's only at $26 right now, so why can't CmdrTaco just buy them and take care of it himself?
  • Actually, this site dodesn't profit from the banners. It is a namezero.com site, which is a company that gives out free domain names. They provide free e-mail accounts and web redirectors. The catch is, of course, that they have a frame at the bottom of everything to help pay for the domain and hosting costs.

    Therefore, the person who registered salshdot.org doesn't make one cent. Granted, that means that he didn't pay one cent either, but...

    It all fairness, it was a guy with a bit time on his hands who decided to fill in a few forms and get a "free" domain. (They charge you $15 to transfer your domain out, since domains registered through namezero do not actually have your name on them.) These domains are good for dicksize wars between grade 10 students. :P

    - Ed.
  • Is CmdrTaco supposed to answer this? If you did a whois, you would have noticed slapdash.org is registered by somebody in London, who felt like pointing it at slashdot.org. Maybe you should ask him?
  • I wonder what kind of traffic these sites actually get... and how many people, *really* click on a banner for some hardcore pr0n site when they were just trying to execute a search on yahoo.com (or whatever one prefers), and mistyped the URL?

    It's the fact that you can't immediately tell that you're not on the right site that is evil. Recently I hit www.google.net instead of google.com. Oops. Only... it *looked* like google.com so I didn't notice it right away. Google.net was reserving google.com in a frame. What really bugged me was that it stayed in the frame. Every link that I hit from the google.net search (and the click-path from there on) was potentially recorded by google.net. The added banner ad was just gravy for them (I'm certain that there *are* at least a few people who'd click on the pr0n site banner ad)

    hymie

  • idiots taking advantage of other idiots is a fact of life. Don't type the damn URL wrong, and make sure you have the correct URL before you hop on over there and you save yourself a lot of problems.

    http://www.google.com will probably find what you are looking for if you are really concerned w/not hitting a page full of ads and whatnot.

    freedom of speech is a great thing. you are free to do whatever you like on the Internet (pretty much). If the WIPO has a problem, tough cookies. I will give them some milk to ease them down.

    Just my worthless .02
  • Just put in a little snippet of code in your <index.pl> to break it out of that site?

    I don't know perl, but the Javascript equivalent is:

    <head>
    <script language="JavaScript">
    <!--
    if (self != top) top.location.href = window.location.href;
    //--></script>
    </head>

    --
  • Now this seems as though it could be a real bad slashdot type site. When you go to it you may notice that (even if your logged in) it says that you are not.

    Thus... when you type in your password and login as it asks you to. . . well, I just wouldn't "if I were you."

    This is a perfect example of place where WIPO could come in handy.
  • The thing is they arn't "really" suing, nor are they spending outrageous amounts of money. The reason? WIPO -- it arbitrates domain name disputes. Because of WIPO people dont have to have a lot of money to get a domain name dispute resolved...
  • I don't really have too big of a problem with typo squatting. I'm not the best speller in the world so I seem to run into a lot of stupid domains (ie microwharehouse.com).
    Overall it's an honest mistake and isn't a big deal. The one thing that pisses me off to no end is when you goto a "typo-squat" domain and it leads you into an unescapeable vortex of banners and popups. Ugghhhh, usually if I'm expecting to hit a buncha pop-ups and banners I'll just turn java*, cookies, etc off. They don't even give you time to prepare!
    Anyway, pointless rant. No useful information in post. Speaking the mind =)
  • Hey, leave us squaters alone to squate in peace.
  • slashdo.org, slahdot.org, sashdot.org, slashot.org, slshdot.org, slasdot.org, slashdo.org
    all lead to slahdot.org (on sale if you want it!)

    slashdot.com - I didn't know that was the same thing? Oh well. Learn something new everyday.

    slashdot.net is a publisher of some sort.

    slachdot.org, slashdt.org leads to some namezero site. No idea here.

    http://www.lashdot.org/ - Under construction. Who knows.

    Still couldn't find the site that is slashdot with a banner ad. I'm retarded.

  • pirst fost? (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    pirst fost?

  • my example : boogle.com (Score:3)

    by aint ( 183045 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @09:02PM (#663913)
    Hi! I own and operate boogle.com [boogle.com] which is similar to google.com [google.com] , well, a little similar at least :-)

    It started out with about 150 unique visitors a day and has gone up to about 700. What I've done to "combat" evil ways is a redirect, so if one types : boogle.com/search [boogle.com] it will redirect to googles (yes people type this) or actually, anything other then real boogle pages redirect. Used to have a "how to google" page but theirs has really improved and is much more useful now so I recently removed it.

    In short, I earn about $10 per day through the affiliate program at one cent per use. I've not yet contacted google but am fairly certain they know I exist. But plan to share this news soon to see if they hate me (hmm, maybe they are reading this!) Plans are in the works to add various features, we'll see. I find that MANY do not know how to use search engines and it seems do not desire to learn [google.com] how on their own either so, I'm planning an "ask boogle" (will use alternative to word 'ask' of course) where boogle users will tell me what they are looking for and in turn, I will tell them how I conducted the search and archive these for future generations to learn from. In tests, people have liked this. I consider myself to be a good searcher (18 hours a day will do this) so might as well use these skills.

    So why am I writing these words? Well, here is one way I've made success off a misspelling and am proud of it. Crazy thing is, some people actually hear and think boogle when friends tell them google - this theory has been tested, so it's not completely a misspelling issue but also miscommunication. I like this! :-) Boogle is at a crossroads and am building a backend as we speak!

    Also, I own hoogle and toogle - they get about 10 or so hits a day each - not even close to boogle. I have planned to turn those over to google (if they accept) but keep boogle, unless sued. So this is my "success story" and it pays for my bandwidth and food! I love google and can't help but spread the word!

    -- .sig --

  • HUH !! it's namezero.com

    I dont like namezero
    people thought they can get FREE domain.
    but what they get is domain for temporarry use.
    the real person want to buy that domain cant buy it OR have to pay more :(
  • yeah, they're both domains that someone got for free at namezero.com, because they didn't think helping out Rob was worth paying $70 for.

    --

  • It's not just websites (Score:3)

    by Snowfox ( 34467 ) <snowfoxNO@SPAMsnowfox.net> on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:32PM (#663916) Homepage

    Websites aren't the only concern here. I have a friend working at Microsoft. Recently, I e-mailed, mistyping the Microsoft domain name. Minutes later, I was inundated with advertisements for "discount" Windows products.

    Somebody out there is harvesting e-mail sent to mis-typed domain names and using the addresses for target spamming.

  • Re:Typos? (Score:3)

    by Burning1 ( 204959 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @09:55PM (#663917) Homepage
    Okay, this is going to end up another "Why is that post moderated up" but I do have a point:

    Remember that not everyone knows how to spell Altavista. If someone told you Alt*ae*vis*ta on the street, you may end up trying any number of erroneous domain names... Perhaps actavista, Aliavista, autavista, or even antavista? :-)

    Look at MY URL: http://www.nodachi.net. When I tell someone "Nodachi", they most likely end up spelling it "Nodatchi", "Nodotchi" or "Nodotchee."

    (Hell, word spells it "Nod", "Noachian", and "Joachim"...)

    Otherwise, good point.

  • WIPO makes a GOOD decision for once . . . (Score:3)

    by Lostman ( 172654 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:33PM (#663918)
    The full text of the WIPO decision can be found at http://arbiter.wi po. int/domains/decisions/html/d2000-0848.html [wipo.int]. If you read this decision you can find an interesting piece of news: Altavista requested a blanket order forcing the domain name registrar used by Grandtotalfinances to hand over any similiar misspellings to AltaVista. The presiding WIPO panelist thankfully turned down that request -- while Grandtotalfinances acted in bad faith other "typo" sites MAY not have acted in bad faith.

    Imagine that--WIPO not immediately finding that people are acting in bad faith: At least its a start.
  • you've never heard the expression "oops, i fat fingered it" before??

    oh well...maybe you just need to eat more, you skinny fuck! :P


    FluX
    After 16 years, MTV has finally completed its deevolution into the shiny things network

  • Skwate-ing (Score:3)

    by innerFire ( 1016 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:34PM (#663920) Homepage

    One wonders if Taco's typo was intentional, or just another instance of inadvertant self-parody by the Slashdot crew.

  • Back in 1997 totalnews.com was pulled in courtrooms by CNN, Reuters and six other media companies. The reason was, totalnews used frames to link all the newscontent form CNN etc. Joe Surfer never noticed the news weren't coming from TN.

    Later, TN and the media companies made some kind of deal about the situation, and the case was pulled out of courtroom.

    -P
    --
  • I'm afraid I would have to agree. I really enjoy surfing the web at work, and mistyping a site name and being redirected to bunghole.com, just as the boss is walking by. What a treat.

    I wonder what kind of traffic these sites actually get... and how many people, *really* click on a banner for some hardcore pr0n site when they were just trying to execute a search on yahoo.com (or whatever one prefers), and mistyped the URL?
  • Block connections with salshdot.org as a referrer, or better yet, send a redirect to http://slashdot.org/ with target="_top". Banner disappears.
  • Cause then it forces the JVM to load in your browser, which gives a noticable and annoying delay.

    People used to bitch all the time about the JavaScript banners on Slashdot for the same reason. It stalls loading the page until the JVM has finished loading.

    (And yes, you can get through quite a few sites without encountering any JavaScript. Thank god.)

    - Ed.
  • And, really, how he any different from Lars?
    Ummm do you really want me to answer this?
    Well lets see, he doesn't want someone to resell slashdot for a profit.
    Someone tarnishs his name instead of just copying it.
    To make a comparison Rob would be like lars if he went after every single ad remover and banned them and got legislation against them... do you see him doing that?
  • This is an interesting ruling, considering the telephone "typosquatting" rule between Holiday Inn and 800 Reservations, Inc. The court ruled that since the number was not used as a trademark, it created no confusion.

    More information about this case [ljx.com]

  • I've read and reread the post....what typo?
  • The owner of salshdot.org [salshdot.org] has said that he registered the site in good faith. He didn't put the banner there; NameZero did. He isn't even getting any money for it! So everybody (including Taco) shouldn't be getting his or her panties in a knot.
  • The rationale for this is that these sites were not registered in good faith.

    This is definatley true. Look at what PayPaI did (http://www.paypaI.com/ in some fonts looks exactly like http://www.paypal.com/). If they hadn't been caught, a lot of people could of lost alot of money. I also didn't like the mighty surprise I got in school when I tried to visit NASA at http://www.nasa.com/. Anyone remember that? The rules on "typosquatting" should be stronger than those on plain-old cybersquatting ;-)

  • It's not some 'kid' typo-squatting for the helluvit. For a start, there are over 40 of them, which is a fairly substantial $$ investment.

    At least one of the alta-vista typo-sites advertises itself as
    "The Official Incest Website"
    - not the kind of stuff unsuspecting surfers people should be ambushed with against their will, and not the kind of stuff the average kid out to make a fast $ from alta-vista is going to put on his site.

  • Dear Sir/Madam... On behalf of of Cheap Porn Inc. ( Come see our new features at www.oursite.com!! Great new selection, hundreds to choose from!! ), Online-Gambling.org ( Visit our site in the next 30 days and get $50 gambling money free!! You could already be a winner!!) and Taco Bell (My Chalupa!) we are sorry to inform you that the letter you sent to
    Jane Doe 234 W. Seminary Rd
    Could not be delivered and is enclosed in this envelope. Sorry for the inconvenience and be sure to visit our sponsors. Also, vote George W. Bush in the upcoming elections ( Sponsored by the Republican National Commitee.)

  • If you lookup the IP, it's going to the real /. after all. The reason you are no longer logged in is because your cookie is for slashdot.org, not for slapdash.
  • hey cmdrtaco,

    how abaout a permanently changing framebuster javascript? shouldn't be that hard...

    if in frame -> redirect to "http://slashdot.org"

    PAT
  • me again,

    sorry for my bad english, i meant "ever changing framebuster javascript code". so that it can't filtered out by the typosquatter...

    PAT
  • Go to any supermarket. There are named brands. The supermarket generally has their own products which are sold at a lower price right next to the 'genuine' product. The 'genuine' product manufacturers have spent a great deal of R&D & Marketing to get the product look & feel, packaging etc. The supermarkets just rip their designs off and sell products with names or packaging which is very very similar.

    The net isn't special, it's just an extension of real life. If it happens in real life, chances are it will happen on the net.

    If the guys at /. are sooo pissed off about it then put a bit of javascript or whatever to break out of the frame.

    Just stop being such a whinger.
  • My site: 4GuysFromRolla.com [4guysfromrolla.com]
    Cybersquatter: FourGuysFromRolla.com [fourguysfromrolla.com]

    Annoying, yes, but I take it as a bit of a compliment... one of those things that if you have to worry about it, you know you're doing decent traffic.

  • An older example is when (I think) AT&T promoted a free phone number 1-800-OPERATOR ... one of their competitors created 1-800-OPERATER and evidently picked up a vast proportion of the calls from the advert... D If you cannot convince them, confuse them
  • Since slapdash.org is simply an alias (CNAME
    record) for slashdot.org, I really don't see how
    logging in would be a problem. The reason you
    don't become logged in is because the domain name
    doesn't match the cookie domain name. If you log
    in, it'll simply create an identical cookie to
    your slashdot.org cookie, but with slapdash.org.
    Now, I suppose if whoever registered slapdash.org
    decided to all of a sudden change the DNS record
    to point to his own site, he could start
    harvesting slashdot cookies... But then, I don't
    even see how slapdash.org is a "typo" for
    slashdot.org!
  • I realise that not everyone uses Javascript, even without downloading the slashcode I'd be 99.99% sure that there wasn't any Javascript on /.

    That's why I made the little disclaimer that I didn't know perl. If I did, I would have used perl, but as I don't, I used whatever language I do know...

    (at least I didn't use vbscript :)
    --

  • Okay, let's change the emphasis marks a bit and see what happens.

    I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which frames Slashdot with a 2nd banner ad. Now I don't care ... but this fools about 1 person every 2-3 days, and they flame me for selling out and doing something so horrible as framing Slashdot for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that frame the site are pretty slimey, but as long as the typo site provides a link to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em.

    Now, I'm not sure, but this doesn't look to me like he "couldn't care less". It seems to me that he was fairly irritated. I'll grant you that he seems more irritated now, but I think some more responsible highlighting of words is in order, here.

  • "squating" -- it's spelled "squatting".

    I don't run Slash, but I'm going to guess that there's no aspell integration. :)

    -Waldo
  • Let me just bold something else, your post is a bit misleading:

    • I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which frames Slashdot with a 2nd banner ad. Now I don't care ... but this fools about 1 person every 2-3 days, and they flame me for selling out and doing something so horrible as framing Slashdot for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that frame the site are pretty slimey, but as long as the typo site provides a link to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em


  • I'm with the WIPO on this one. It isn't fair that an individual profits off of the success of other people. I'm sure you've done quite a lot of work on slashdot, and you said yourself that it pissed you off when people frame slashdot with extra ads, but they're all like that. If they all happily redirected to the correct page, then a) it wouldn't be a problem where the WIPO would have to intervene and b) nobody would care enough to do it because they wouldn't gain anything. Though I didn't read the article, I'm sure that it was NOT a typo domain that simply redirected to altavista.com. You can't just be in favor of the "good intentioned" typo sites, those aren't the ones causing the controversy.

    These typo domains are helping nobody but the culprit, and most likely, they're hurting other people. These people are cheating off of other people's hard work. How can you support that?

  • Re:Where is it??? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Do HTTP Referer headers point back at the frame that referenced them? If so, it should be trivial to put these sites out of business - just have the server return a page saying "you misspelled slashdot and now some jerk is making you look at an ad"

    Of course, they could still actually download the slashdot page and host the content locally, but then you've got grounds for more substantive legal action.

    Of course, if browsers send the original referer along for a request for a framed page, this won't work. So sad.

  • You are confusing JavaScript with Java applets. You don't have to load a JVM for javascript: the browsers usually run javascript themselves (IE has an ActiveX control that runs JScript, I'm not sure about netscape).
  • I actually think you - and many other typosquatters are doing the net a favour...

    Let's face it, we all are prone to typos - especially those of us who spend most of their waking days at various keyboards - and most people hate a getting a 404 or server not found.

    So, as long as the squatter uses the same content or redirects, and maybe makes a few bucks - good on him.

    I would even go as far as saying that the people who force sites into frames and display their own banners are still doing me a service. What takes longer - to load a banner or to retype the url and reload the whole home page?

    Furthermore, the commercialization of the net is about visitor numbers, or so they claim. If someone mistypes, lands somewhere else and is still sent to the site he/she wanted to go in the first place, then the squatter just increased the traffic of the target site. So, what could be wrong with that?
  • Yes there is.



    It's called PerlScript.


    Go to http://www.activestate.com/Products/ActivePerl/Dow nload.html [activestate.com] and download it for Windows (it's part of a whole load of other stuff).

  • "The panel finds the respondent is in bad faith because...the respondent is deliberately using complainant's famous trademarks with the aim of misleading the public and siphoning off the 'Chanel' trademark's accumulated good will for profit," (actually quoated from an earlier ruling regardin Chanel)

    I find it interesting that the test they apply is a good faith test. In these circumstances I think good faith tests are inherently righteous tests since the actions in question can be pretty easily distinguished as good or bad faith. Now some might argue that such a subjective test is a problem, but the law does deal with subjective tests all the time (although in the Anglo tradition many of these tests were left to juries to evaluate, and I bet there weren't no jury at WIPO). Typo squatting really doesn't have much of a leg to stand on it pretty much an unconscionable way of getting the attention of users. (but what about the days when altavista.com wasn't even owned by altavista, kinda puts a hole in the whole aregument really, anyway I digress)

    An interesting "grey" area would be a site such as astslavista.com where clearly the name is a play on the phrase from the "renegade" in Terminator and the name altavista, but I would think they would have a fairly strong defence

  • Funny that you're not sure since the seller on ebay appears to be someone named ravenwolff. Coincidence? Not fucking likely.
  • ... so where does that put me ? I wanted to kind of use them as hotwail : Complaints about hot*ail accounts (privacy, links to the m*n etc) hotwhale : A silly little free email site, just so folks can say to each other "No, it's a hotwhale address" (and also manage to get a memorable email address rather than xyz99xxx_fred@hot*ail.com). Any comments ? Where does this put me ?!?!
  • > Perl would not work

    Yes it would. The server can just send back an empty page with a link to the real site if he notices that the referer is salshdot.org. Or send a meta refresh tag. No client side script needed.

  • Back when the 10-10 dial-around codes were starting to proliferate, I was brainstorming about creating my own long distance company:

    • I would call it 10-10-322.
    • I would do no marketing at all.
    • I would charge 15 dollars a minute.
    :-)


    -- Eric W. Sink
  • Didn't WIPO determine that typosquating IS cybersquating?

    Should be typosquating = cybersquating

    Looks like a standard newbie mistake, throwing a comparison operator in where you should have an assignment. ;)

    This pedantic piece of wisdom brought to you by the letters J-O-K-E.

  • Re:One more time (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which frames Slashdot with a 2nd banner ad. Now I don't care ... but this fools about 1 person every 2-3 days, and they flame me for selling out and doing something so horrible as framing Slashdot for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that frame the site are pretty slimey, but as long as the typo site provides a link to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em.
  • ...that Slashdot could technically have WIPO force those with /. typo domains to give them up.

  • And it got modded up! I guess this is living proof: Be true to your ideals, never sell out, always stand up for what you believe in, and you will eventually find favor.

    Troll on, oh pirst foster. Though your karma will disappear into the Slashdot bit bucket, it will live on in the hearts and minds of those who love you, whoever you may be.

  • Every link that I hit from the google.net search (and the click-path from there on) was potentially recorded by google.net.

    Actually, they couldn't've been tracking you. Just being inside their frameset gives the site no additional powers to track you. You're not going through their servers, and they have no additional JavaScript powers to track you just because you're in their frameset.

    One at a time: It's really, really difficult for a web proxy to keep you inside of the proxy, whether that proxy be for the purpose of tracking you, providing anonymity for you, or whatever. Believe me, I know, building such a proxy is what I do for a living. Of course, were such a proxy to keep you inside of the proxy, it could track you at an arbitrary level of detail.

    It's pretty much impossible, barring some horrible bug in Netscape or IE that you'll likely hear about on the 6 o'clock news, for one page in a frameset (or in another window that you have open at the same time; it's all the same to the browser) to tell what you're doing on another frame, unless the two frames are from the same domain. And in order to keep you in the same domain, it would have to proxy your requests. See above.

    So, take heart. While I can't check to see exactly what google.net is doing (since the site seems to be down at the moment), I can fairly well assure you that whatever they're doing, they're not logging your activities. Because they can't.

  • The decision of the arbitrators in this example seems to be warranted

    I'm concerned, however, that present and future domain name disputes may be wrongly construed as "typo-squatting," regardless of the intention of the alleged offender. Although the term "typo-squatting" is appropriate in this case -- as the defendant capitalized on common mispellings -- I can see the potential for such a term to devolve into another jingo easily manipulated to trivialize the interests of small website operators regardless of legitimate intent/ fair use; another catchphrase to be leveraged by corporations intent on ammassing valuable domain real-estate.

    My concern is magnified by the potential for disparate bargaining power among the parties in such a dispute -- i.e. fan site vs. multinational media conglomerate.

    Anyone interested in perusing a compendium of past domain name disputes might want to check out the Consumer Project on Technology's (CPT [cptech.org]) page on Selected Domain Name Disputes [cptech.org]. This site describes in detail (and links to) relevant decisions made by the arbitrator.

    I'm currently on leave from CPT, and will return in several weeks.

    Sincerely,
    Vergil

  • 'slimy' is spelled wrong also...

  • Whaddya wanna bet that's what all the "free" redirector services are doing too? If not then soon as they run out of cash from VC nitwits.


    Think how popular you're going to be when people find out that mailing your redirector address causes them to start receiving junk mail spam!

  • Something that is sort of like something else but not enough to be legally like something else such as copyright or trademark infringement. Nice to see some altruistic NGO taking on the burden of legal arbiter. Especially in domains that it has no parvue. Here's my plan. Start a church called the Chruch of Jefus Chrisp. Let's see if millions of bewildered souls are confused and accidently contribute to it. Heck, if the response rate is anything like direct mail then I can retire tomorrow and buy my own country.

    This is a joke people - so don't get carried away. Oh wait - I forgot this is /. No humor allowed. Only self righteous bullshit. The kind of one dimensional moral absolutism you pick up freshman or sophmore year. If you have found any typos in this note so far please sue me. I wouldn't want stupid people to accidently confuse me with someone else.

    I can't wait to see what's next - maybe someone will create a domain that is intentionally misspelled or vague just so they can sue everyone else. And then those people can cry to the WIPO about how they were wronged by someone who was intentionally vague in the hope of being sued.

    We have instructions on shampoo bottles - w'dya expect?
  • Try going to www.slashdot.org. If you always go to slashdot.org, you won't be logged in. That's because logged in means you have a cookie for slashdot.org, not www.slashdot.org.

  • I wonder what kind of traffic these sites actually get

    http://www.googol.com/ has over 300,000 hits this year. I don't think it would be doing that well without Google, but this guy has a legitimate claim. After all, his site *does* have material about the googol, as well as the googolhedron, which I never thought of before.

  • Re:This pisses CmdrTaco off? hehe (Score:4)

    by Fervent ( 178271 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @06:01PM (#663984)
    hehe

    I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which fra m es Slashdot with a 2nd banner a d. Now I don' t care ... but this f o ols about 1 person every 2-3 days, and t hey fl a me me for se l ling out and doing so m ething so horrible as framing Slashd o t for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that f r ame the site are pretty slimey, but as l o ng as the typo site provides a li n k to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em.

  • Remember that 2600 [2600.com] registered [2600.com] www.guinessrecords.com [guinessrecords.com] to protest the real Book of Records portrayal of Kevin Mitnick. Shouldn't something like this be allowed just as "MicrosoftSucks.org" is/should be? Follow the links for more info.
  • I can't think of any websites like that....*cough*whitehouse.com*cough*

  • Yes, I know that this is a bad question, since it just encourages them, but I'm wondering...

    Where is the typo site that Frames /. ?

    I've typed in several typos in my day, and I've never ended up with this site. I have heard of it at least ten times (in articles). So, I'm curious.

    Where is it???
    --

  • U.N. (Score:4)

    by suss ( 158993 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:38PM (#663995)
    GENEVA -- U.N. arbitrators ruled on Monday that a cybersquatter with addresses in Panama and Latvia must give up 43 domain names it had registered containing variations of the name of the Internet search service AltaVista Co.

    ...and if they dont want to give up their domain names, the U.N. is going to send in the blue helmets to stare them out?
  • It's interesting to see the "other perspective" portrayed on Slashdot for once. Usually we only hear about victims of corporate lawsuits; here we're hearing about some squatters who perhaps need to be "victimized" by an Andover lawsuit or two.

    The sad fact of life is that no matter what stance you take, some people are going to be worse off as a result. Media innovators, archivists, and consumers are going to lose out if IP laws are practiced too rigidly, but media producers and artists will lose out of IP laws are too loose. Obviously, Sting shouldn't be able to take back sting.com (and he didn't), but is slahsdot.com another story? There's two sides to every coin.

    Don't get me wrong, I'm certainly advocating the fascist use of IP laws that the MPAA and RIAA practice. But I think it's worth understanding the resistance that some artists and producers have to the free software / new media ideals. Slashdot is Rob's baby; it's easy to understand while he might feel upset if someone tries to piggyback off its success and tarnish its name. And, really, how he any different from Lars?

  • This pisses CmdrTaco off? (Score:4)

    by FattMattP ( 86246 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:39PM (#663999) Homepage
    but some really piss me off... like the Slashdot typo sites that frame slashdot with extra banner ads.
    No shit? Just several weeks ago you couldn't have cared less [slashdot.org]:
    I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which frames Slashdot with a 2nd banner ad. Now I don't care ... but this fools about 1 person every 2-3 days, and they flame me for selling out and doing something so horrible as framing Slashdot for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that frame the site are pretty slimey, but as long as the typo site provides a link to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em.
    I'm looking forward to buying my own Andover.net approved CmdrTaco media sock puppet from ThinkGeek this Christmas! ;-)

  • SlapDash? (Score:3)

    by davidu ( 18 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:40PM (#664000) Homepage Journal


    Explain this one?
    http://www.slapdash.org [slapdash.org]
    I am not saying you are squatting, I like the name, but why?

    -Davidu
  • HUH? How is "I'm cool with most of them, even though some piss me off" equivalent to "the government should crack down on all of them"?

    You seem ot have misread.

  • Maybe Netscape is stupid enough to load the JVM whenever JavaScript is run, but IE doesn't do that. As the other posters pointed out, Java!=JavaScript, but I do seem to recall that some earlier versions of Netscape loaded the JVM whenever any kind of scripting was involved...

    At any rate, I'm pretty sure you can grab the URL from within Perl, since it's one of the CGI environment variables. Then, based on that, he could put a big red warning up on the page, along with a link to the real Slashdot.

  • Maybe NameZero is the owner!
    ---
  • I have no problem with typo squatting as a whole, but there are a dozen Slashdot typo sites, one of which frames Slashdot with a 2nd banner ad. Now I don't care ... but this fools about 1 person every 2-3 days, and they flame me for selling out and doing something so horrible as framing Slashdot for extra ad space. So I guess typo sites that frame the site are pretty slimey, but as long as the typo site provides a link to the correct site, I'm totally cool with 'em.

    ---
  • From last night's Simpsons...

    "Whenever you notice something like that... a wizard did it."

    "Wizard."

  • Typos? (Score:4)

    by ottffssent ( 18387 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @06:47PM (#664023)
    actavista? Aliavista? autavista? antavista? Take a look at a keyboard, folks. The C and L are on opposite sides of the keyboard. So are the I and T, though they're closer. L and U are on the same hand, but aren't next to each other (even on diagonals). Same with L and N. Not every letter-substitution deserves to be called a 'typo' in my book.

    Are there really people out there who type this badly? I can see the argument for names with characters right next to each other. I can see it for missing characters (alavista, for example) because some people have crappy keyboards that click sometimes when a key isn't pressed. I can see it for swapped letters (atlavista), and for added letters (altravista) next to ones you really are supposed to type, but a bunch of people at WIPO have a really negative opinion of the typing prowess of the average net user if they think enough people are legitimately mistyping a C (in qwerty, the middle finger of the left hand) when they mean to type an L (the ring finger of the right hand) that it's worth their time to arbitrate the dispute.

    If someone's typing ability is really that bad, wouldn't they at least be in the habbit of checking what they've typed before hitting enter, given the number of times they must screw things up typing?

    I'm not saying that typo squatting is fine (though in most cases I'd say it is), but can't we at least pick plausable cases to argue about?

  • Re:Where is it??? (Score:4)

    by FattMattP ( 86246 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:43PM (#664028) Homepage
    Where is the typo site that Frames /. ?
    http://www.salshdot.org/ [salshdot.org]

  • yeah.... (Score:4)

    by fluxrad ( 125130 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:45PM (#664030)
    the problem is, every time i come here to slutdot.org, i read an article, i post my reply, i quit my browser, i get like 50 annoying pop-ups telling me about these live horny women that want to have sex with me.

    taco should really try to get more conservative advertisers.


    FluX
    After 16 years, MTV has finally completed its deevolution into the shiny things network
  • I was at a MacFrugals recently, and found this little address book thingy. It was in the same style case as a portable CD player, and popped open with addresses to write in. The real funny thing about it was the name of the "manufacturer": Panashiba.

    I support the EFF [eff.org] - do you?
  • http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem& item=485096924
  • Please email Taco about this.. He is really confusing the intent of NameZero. They're NOT trying to make money of his domain or be slimey by cybersquatting. It wasn't even their choice to register the domain. Someone else, probably someone who frequently typed slahsdot.org, had to register it, and that person doesn't get any money whatsoever from it. There's nothing slimy about it. Frankly I'm mad at Taco for jumping to conclusions without even trying to understand what's going on.

    Hell, if he was all that mad about it, he could include Javascript code to break out of the frame easily.

    --
  • Oh, please. Whoever registered the domain name isn't getting anything from it; the frame and banner are NameZero's. If NameZero didn't require them, I'd bet that they wouldn't be there and it'd be a transparent link to the real Slashdot. There's nothing "slimey" about it.

    --
  • Perl would not work. Client side scripting is required to break out of the frame. There is no such thing as client side perl scripting, so you could not rewrite your JavaScript code in perl.
  • What a weenie! He didn't even pay for the domain name -- he got it through namezero! Slepped up a little frame with a link to slashdot, and that's it.
    -russ
  • Using a quick nslookup and netscape, we find www.salshdot.org which uses banners, and basically the other big slashdot typo sites are:

    www.slashdto.org
    www.slashdt.org
    www.sashdot.org
    www.slshdot.org
    www.slsahdot.org
    www.slasdot.org
    www.salhdot.org

    There's perhaps a few more, I'm tired and don't feel like wasting more time investigating ;)

  • 'White-Hat' domain registers (Score:4)

    by Masem ( 1171 ) on Monday October 30, 2000 @04:50PM (#664051)
    I remember back before WIPO and the term 'cybersquatting' was developed, there were legitamit registered sites that had the typoed domains for large sites, and on those domains simply had a 15 second redirect and a link to the real site, with the only 'advertizing' was that this service was brough to you by such and such. No banner ads or anything else like framing the other site. These types of sites were cool before we were engrained with knowing the domains explicitly, and they got only minimal advertizing dollars for that $35/yr for registering the name.
    <P>
    Here, obviously, the group registered the domains in bad faith, hoping to make some money with the domains, and other WIPO cases of late have been a similar nature with those that did specifically grab typo sites trying to make big cash off of them.
    <P>
    But let's say I know of a popular site X, and whenever I go there by typing in the domain name, 5% of the time I mistype and go to a "domain not found" error page. I decide to register that domain, and simply do the same redirect and link as was done originally, and I let site X know about it, and being the 'white hat' that I am, I suck the costs for simply maintaining that site, with the only stipulation that I have a link to my own web site so that people know who helped out here. Could that, under some of the more extreme WIPO rules, be considered squatting? I hope not, but I'd like to see something a bit more concrete on the squatting rules.
    <P>

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