For a company just a few weeks old, Verizon Wireless sure doesn't take criticism very well.
To thwart anyone from mocking Verizon's wireless service, a lawyer registered the domain name verizonsucks.com. The lawyer is with the law firm Arnold and Porter, which represents Bell Atlantic, the company that launched Verizon with Vodafone Airtouch.
So it should be no surprise that Verizon lawyers were not amused when hacker-zine 2600 Magazine purchased verizonreallysucks.com.
Verizon's lawyers on Friday sent a nastygram to 2600 publisher Emmanuel Goldstein.
"This letter is to inform you that your registration and/or use of these domain names infringes Bell Atlantic's valuable trademark rights in the 'Verizon' mark and violates the new Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act," warned Bell Atlantic attorney Sarah Deutsch.
That law, which Congress approved last year, prevents anyone from registering a domain name similar to a trademark if they have "a bad faith intent to profit from" that trademark.
The problem for Verizon: 2600 didn't want to "profit" from verizonreallysucks.com. They just wanted to occasionally poke fun at a large company, which means that the anti-cybersquatting law does not apply.
"Verizon intends to go after anyone who criticizes them on the Net, abusing the intent of this law to accomplish their goal. We cannot allow this. We call on INDIVIDUALS around the world to criticize Verizon on as many domain names as possible and to exercise your rights to free speech," 2600's Goldstein wrote in an open letter on his website.
Just to prove his point, Goldstein then registered another domain name: VerizonShouldSpendMoreTimeFixingItsNetworkAndLessMoneyOnLawyers.com
