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Is it legal to use bitcoin in a domain name? Not a sub domain, but in the main domain name.
Is it legal to use bitcoin in a domain name?
Answers
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To date, no entity has trademarked word "Bitcoin" in the US. This means that it's highly unlikely that any US entity would file against your domains under the ICANN Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy.
There was a servicemark application for Bitcoin, but it was abandoned in July 2011.
Related trademark applications
- Bitpay applied for Merchant Solutions for the bitcoin currency and Bitcoin Merchant Solutions, both also abandoned.
There is one for Bitcoin appliance, also abandoned.
Bitcoin Magazine applied for a trademark, and it's still in processing.
Mt. Gox registered it. https://mtgox.com/press_release_20111014.html http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=128254.msg1365911#msg1365911
What do you mean 'in' a domain name? A domain name which contains the substring 'bitcoin'? Buying a domain name with bitcoin? Putting a bitcoin address on a website? – Pieter Wuille – 2013-01-27T21:08:47.483
@PieterWuille like bitcoinShop.com so the main domain name has the word bitcoin in it not a subdomain like bitcoin.example.com – incoe – 2013-01-27T21:21:18.410
Why would that be illegal? Is is not allowed to have a website with the name dollar in it? – Pieter Wuille – 2013-01-27T21:22:23.017
1@PieterWuille just wanted to make sure cause its based on MIT license and opensource but the name it self might be registered for some reason. Thanks for your help Pieter :)) – incoe – 2013-01-27T21:27:57.337