Okay, just one big boy. Earlier this month I got a letter from a layer hired by Verizon (both by certified mail and by e-mail) demanding that I turn over the domain name superiorpages.com to Verizon with no compensation. Their claim is that my registration of that name violates trademark law, because they own superpages.com and my domain is too close to theirs and would “confuse their customers”. (For the record, at the time of this entry, superiorpages.net and superiorpages.org do not seem to be taken. I wonder why they haven’t registered those to keep others from getting them?)

I’d registered this name a few years ago for a project I’ve yet to actually complete, but a valid one that has nothing to do with Verizon. I sent back a response explaining this, and how I thought there was a big difference between “super” and “superior”, and tried to explain the whole concept of what “Superior” means around here, next to Lake Superior.

It seems that I’m not the only one that Verizon has bullied, though. They’ve also tried to quash criticism.

If you’d like to see the letter that Verizon sent me, you can see the original PDF.

In my response, I stated that since I’d not had time to actually complete my project, I’d be willing to entertain an offer for compensation for the domain. Not sure if they’ll spend a ton of money trying to not give me any money. What really irks me though is that they’re going with the whole trademark violation thing which ties into the cybersquatting thing, and none of that has a damn thing to do with this domain name.

If you’ve had a similar experience, I’d like to hear about it. You can bet I’ll provide updates here if they continue to pursue things unfairly.