A. Your Rights As a Trademark Owner

Why should you care whether or not your domain name is a trademark? Because as the owner of a trademark, you have legal rights that may be very important for your business. If you're the first person or business to actually use a trademark in connection with the sale of goods or services, you are the "senior user," and you have priority in case of a conflict with a later user. This is true whether or not you've registered the trademark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Example: Peter develops software for taking orders over the Web and launches the sale of his Bearware software online. He uses the mark Bearware prominently on his website and as his domain name, bearware.com. Peter makes his software available for purchase online under the mark Bearware and through the domain name bearware.com on February 1, 2000, so that is the date of first use for purposes of trademark seniority. Gail develops similar software and also plans to market it under the trademark and domain name Bearware.com. But Gail doesn't offer her software for sale until March 1, 2000.
Because Peter was the first to use the mark Bearware to sell his software, he is the senior user. If Gail sues him for trademark infringement, he will win the right to continue using the mark for selling his software and as his domain name.
If you're the senior user, you can go to court to prevent others from using your trademark—as a domain name or otherwise—if the use would likely cause customers to confuse someone else's product or service with yours, or to be confused as to the origin of the product or service. (See Chapter 7 for more on what constitutes customer confusion.)
Example:Gail decides to sell her software under the Bearware mark over the Internet, but she uses the domain name bareware.com. Peter can sue Gail for trademark infringement, asking the court to stop Gail from using the Bearware mark and the barewear.com domain name. Peter will make a number of claims:
1.He is the senior user of the mark Bearware.
2.Gail's use of the same mark to market and sell her software product (which is similar to Peter's) and her use of a domain name that sounds exactly like Peter's trademark are likely to cause customers to confuse her product and website with Peter's.
3.Gail's use of the same mark as Peter's for a similar software application is likely to cause customers to mistakenly believe that both applications come from the same company.