Since yesterday, ‘Gmail’ domain doesn’t belong to Google anymore, in Germany (probably in Switzerland and Austria too). This is because, the name of the domain (“Gmail”) was first used by a German in creating his own e-mail service. Indeed, this case was running in the court since a while (probably July 2007), but has been resolved yesterday (not sure). Here’s a quote from some news source (from July 2007):
A court in Germany today banned Google from using the name “Gmail” for its popular webmail service following a trademark suit filed by the founder of G-Mail.
Daniel Giersch (33), started using the name G-Mail in 2000, four years before Google released “Gmail”.
“Google infringed the young businessman’s trademark that had been previously been registered,” said the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court in its judgement.
And here’s the link:
Google loses “Gmail” trademark case
And here’s a link for “www.gmail.de”: German Gmail domain
And here’s a screenshot that I captured, when I tried to access “Gmail” from home (yesterday):
I thought this is just one of those cases, where someone files a lawsuit, just because he/she knows that he will get huge bucks in return. But this guy is stubborn that he is not ready to sell that domain. Here’s a quote:
“I have made it clear since the beginning that I will never sell the name,” Giersch said. “It is my sole intention to realise my idea for a hybrid mail system. I am absolutely convinced of its success. Neither “G-mail” nor myself are for sale.”
