Saurik Files Lawsuit Against Cydia.com

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Posted August 23, 2011 at 3:54pm by iClarified

Jay Freeman, also known as Saurik the founder of Cydia, has filed a lawsuit against Cydia.com for allegedly infringing on the Cydia trademark.

According to DomainNameWire, Saurik lost an attempt to gain ownership of the domain under the uniform domain name dispute resolution policy (UDRP) in March. Saurik launched Cydia in 2008; however, the domain was registered by its current owner in 2002.

The lawsuit is asking for an order which will compel VeriSign to transfer the domain name to Saurik and compensate him for attorney fees and costs incurred.

The court filing reveals that Saurik registered the Cydia trademark with the USPTO but does not reveal why he lost the UDRP case. It's possible that Cydia.com used the name in commerce before Saurik thus granting them the rights to the name despite their shady use of the mark. Reportedly, Cydia.com demanded profit-sharing in order to release control of the website and even changed its content to specifically target iPhone users. CYKON the company that owns the domain has over 600 domains registered and by all indications seems to be a cyber squatter. In the United States, cyber squatting is illegal according to the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act.

You can download the full complaint here.

Read More [Omar]

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Andrew - August 23, 2011 at 11:32pm

I wanna make sure i got this correct. Some company registered a domain name. Then 6 years later Saurik uses the name ( by the way, how in the heck did Saurik come up with that unusual name or where the two parties involved previously), the company has the site and does nothing with it but it get visits from people looking for information on Saurik who DIDNT register the name? Said company also has a disclaimer that says not affiliated with Saurik LLC, but they are at wrong? This is why the freaking world is hating on America. First Apple sues everybody for anything even spoken with their so vague patents... now, this? Fraking just register SAURIK.ORG or something like that and move on developing CYDIA.

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Baxter - August 23, 2011 at 11:55pm

You pretty much summed it up but you are overlooking a couple of things. The main problems are 1) Saurik is claiming they have/had Cydia-related content on the page & 2) whether their intent is to actually use the site or sit on the name until someone coughs up big $$ for it, which IS illegal BTW and means they never deserved to get the name in the 1st place. We don't know enough about the circumstances from a short post like this, so it will be up to Saurik (& his lawyers) to prove whether the company is violating the 2 items above and a decision to follow based on findings. I would assume Saurik feels he has some merit or he wouldn't pursue & then simply register a diff name.

Baxter - August 23, 2011 at 9:08pm

They should sell Cydia.com to Saurik at a fair market price. That's the whole premise behind cybersquatting law. Obviously, they don't intend to use the name but are just holding on to it to capitalize. Just because some jerks hatch up a get-rich quick scheme by registering numerous domain names, doesn't mean they should be allowed to. It's very easy to register names so if cases like this continue, then we all suffer as government will eventually step in & force us to fill out a bunch of paper work to justify a name, which means more government infringement, & higher taxes/deficit.

Jeff - August 23, 2011 at 9:23pm

So 6 years from now I should be able to register a trademark of a domain name that already exists today and they should be forced to hand it over to me right? Get a grip.

Frank - August 23, 2011 at 9:38pm

yes, if they are doing nothing but putting spam on it and trying to sell it for profit. if you are legitimately using it, that is another story.

Jeff - August 23, 2011 at 10:13pm

Oh ya? And who made you the domain registration police? Last time I checked, once you register a domain name you are free to do whatever you want with it. Be it spam, porn, or a forum related to Apple devices.

Baxter - August 23, 2011 at 10:27pm

Last you checked? Oh, that must have been before 1999. Thanks to your blatent defending of the abuse of the right to register whatever name you wish, there IS a law against "free to do whatever you want with it". And thanks to you again, you are inviting more government policing because you can't help but abuse a simple system. Try researching a little law and "intent" is everywhere in the spirit of numerous laws, including this one. . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybersquatting . Cybersquatting (also known as domain squatting), according to the United States federal law known as the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act, is registering, trafficking in, or using a domain name with _bad faith intent_ to profit from the goodwill of a trademark belonging to someone else. The cybersquatter then offers to sell the domain to the person or company who owns a trademark contained within the name at an inflated price.

Saurik... the new Apple? - August 23, 2011 at 7:17pm

This kind of thing makes me cringe. The fact that people think that just because they copyright a name they automatically own the rights to EVERYTHING associated with that name is disturbing. The owner had the domain registered 6 years before Cydia was created. Open and shut case. Saurik needs to stop worrying about his precious little trademark and start making Cydia better. First he buys and destroys Rock(which is far better than Cydia IMO) and now he's wasting his time(and money) trying to fight a winless battle.

Jay Freeman (saurik) - August 23, 2011 at 8:08pm

For the record, I "bought" (I put this in quotes, as I am working together with the Rock developers: the correct term here is "merged with") Rock for $0 and some advertising in Cydia for Intelliborn.

Tjp - August 23, 2011 at 6:47pm

Jay needs to reconsider and look at the epix.com court case. The individual who owned the domain prior to an Indiana company registering the epix mark with USPTO won over the company. Prior domain registration trumps late thinkers. Cydia.com owners will likely use this case as it is prevailing precedent. YMMV of course.

Jay Freeman (saurik) - August 23, 2011 at 8:13pm

If they want to own cydia.com, they need to stop using it for things related to Cydia. Their original usage of Cydia.com looked almost identical to this: wokia.com (it had a different image on it, but it was the same layout with mostly random ads): in essence, a typo-sqatting landing page. Over the years, they have made modifications to it to encroach further and further into the realm of Cydia, always correlated to my attempts to negotiate the domain from them. So yeah: they might "win" (and get to keep cydia.com), but they almost certainly are going to "lose" (and be forced to stop using it for things similar to Cydia).

budsal - August 23, 2011 at 6:09pm

I can understand why Saurik wants the name, but he should have gone to GoDaddy to see if his domain name was available before he ever started Cydia. Hell, I remember doing that when I first learned about cydia. I would have bought the domain name myself and sold it to Saurik for $100,000 without issue. Really, he should have used a different name with an available domain.

JC - August 23, 2011 at 7:24pm

That's called cybersquatting and it is illegal.

Jared - August 23, 2011 at 7:37pm

It's not cybersquatting when you buy the domain 6 years before the person who's suing you registers the trademark....

Jay Freeman (saurik) - August 23, 2011 at 8:10pm

However, if the owner of the domain name literally owns many thousands of domain names, many of which are one-off typos of existing brands (like wokia.com), refuses to entertain offers and will not put up a quote, yet claiming to third parties that they are waiting to get the big money from SaurikIT, then it certainly sounds like cybersquatting to me.

Jeff - August 23, 2011 at 8:34pm

Certainly sounds to me like you're just mad. They owned the domain long before you created Cydia, just get over it.

Jay Freeman (saurik) - August 23, 2011 at 8:54pm

Jeff: ...and if they had a reason to own the domain that was not simply to infringe my trademark, that would be a useful point. If they wish to run a pottery website, or a butterfly farm (name would even be good for that), I would almost certainly not be able to win this case; that said, I also would not have filed it in the first place, nor would I have cared that they owned the domain name. However, as they are using cydia.com in areas conflicting with my trademark, until well after I was awarded that trademark (which I didn't even apply for until almost a year after first use), they hopefully do not have a case here.

budsal - August 23, 2011 at 9:02pm

Ok I get that. Question: Why did you use the name Cydia anyway and not something else with an available domain name?

Jeff - August 23, 2011 at 9:27pm

Nowhere on the website does it say anything about being affiliated with SaurikIT. It is simply a forum based on Apple product discussion(which there are hundreds of). Not every website dealing with Apple products is infringing on your trademark. They've owned the domain for 6 years and they can do whatever they want with it. If they were suggesting that they were somehow affiliated with SaurikIT you would have a point. But they aren't. And you won't win.

saurikisa - August 23, 2011 at 4:01pm

this is ridiculous because the domain was registered 6 years before he tried to register for himself. he is just being selfish for suing and trying to get something that someone thought of way before he did.

aseman - August 23, 2011 at 4:06pm

downloading to iphone me plz

Peter - August 23, 2011 at 6:09pm

Did you even read the article? The domain may have been ILLEGALLY registered 6 years earlier.

Johnny - August 23, 2011 at 3:58pm

Apparently their forum (cydia.com) is down because of malicious attacks...someone did that right I believe.