Michelin critics to football blogger: Salaud! Unhand that URL

Michelin restaurant guides have issued a cease-and-desist notice to a blogger who has nabbed the URL michelinguides.com and filled it with photoshopped pictures of European football boss and 1984 European Championship top goalscorer Michel Platini. The blogger bought the domain, retitled it "Michel In Guides" and filled it …

[Anonymous Coward]

Attention Michelin Guides

Whilst you're waving the legal stick around, just buy the domain off him for £5k and have done with it.

[Callam McMillan]

Re: Attention Michelin Guides

... and next time round, don't forget to renew the domain!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Attention Michelin Guides

As much as we all hate trolls and squatters there is no legal comeback here. he is not trading off your name, and he got the domain fair and square. Just pay the twat and remember to renew your domains... (I suspect he wants more than 5k though!)

[Elmer Phud]

Re: Attention Michelin Guides

Downvote for the 'twat' bit.

Not twat at all, not a squatter but for a sick squid it's good for a laugh.

Well worth the initial outlay.

[Ragarath]

Re: Attention Michelin Guides

as a global company, we have to ensure we do everything possible to protect the Michelin brand image.

Well you did not do everything you could. Else you would be using the auto-renew services we have all been using since, well, I can't remember the last time I used a provider where this was not available.

Anyway, good luck to the chap, not squatting, a legal purchase.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Attention Michelin Guides

Why try to defend principles, while you can just pay '"protection money" or rather in this case "abducation racket fee".

This is much less troublesome to pay the abducter, and probably less hazardous too !

Now, sure, as a consequence of this chicken act, a lot of other people will get abducted in the future, since it just proves there is a viable and not dangerous business plan for being an abducter.

But who cares. After all, these "future people to be abducted" are not you. They'll pay the consequences of your chicken act, but since they are "other people", any egocentric maniac wouldn't care a dime for them.

[NumptyScrub]

Re: Attention Michelin Guides

quote: "Why try to defend principles, while you can just pay '"protection money" or rather in this case "abducation racket fee".

This is much less troublesome to pay the abducter, and probably less hazardous too !"

I've half a mind to email him and suggest he change the site content to reviews of tyres; Michelin Guides. Which is, as I'm sure you can see, a completely valid, different potential market use of exactly the same name they let lapse.

Note: most domain trolls just use an ad-strewn parking service with "this domain is for sale!" on there and up the price at every impression. At least this guy is actually using the domain, even if it is obviously parodic.

What they should be doing, though, is following the UDRP (http://www.icann.org/en/help/dndr/udrp) rather than sending bully letters cease and desist notices. The UDRP exists purely for resolving disputes over the ownership of domain names, and there is an expedited process for trademark holders against abusive registrations. Valid registrants who can't be bothered to renew domains (for a couple of years, from the sound of it) have their own fast track process to get a domain back, which they can then forget to renew next year :)

[NightFox]

"As a company with a long motorsport heritage we are very keen on all types of sport, including football. While we appreciate the amusing nature of the website, as a global company, we have to ensure we do everything possible to protect the Michelin brand image."

The biggest tragedy is that the person who wrote that stale, clichéd corporate statement probably has a family who have to put up with him every Christmas Day and are already counting the days down with dread.

[Andrew Moore]

Also:

"we have to ensure we do everything possible to protect the Michelin brand image."

But this does not include renewing our domain names in a timely fashion.

I love the image on the site for "Managing Online Reputations- A Dummies Guide"

[streaky]

Self-inflicted harm regardless, I don't see how they'd have any legal redress.

[Mystic Megabyte]

Swat

Look out Mascall, there is a SWAT team flying over from New Zealand right now!

Reading this story certainly was the best way to start the week. :)

[thesykes]

Some of those pics are good... some are just disturbing

[Alfie]

You have to appreciate the effort he put into those images though. I mean the effort to match the faces to the images he planted them in, not his prowess in PhotoShop, obviously.

Can we have a website like this every Monday morning? It has fair made my day :-)

[Conrad Longmore]

Michelin never owned michelinguides.com

As far as I can tell (well, at least back to 2007) the domain michelinguides.com has never been owned by Michelin. In 2007 it was Keyword Marketing, Inc. registered in St Kitts and Nevis, then in 2011 it resurfaced registered to someone in China. That domain expired in September last year, the current owner registered it in December.

Michelin could file a UDRP complaint, but the owner can claim two defenses - one, there's not a trademark violation because it really is about "Michel in Guides", and secondly even if it IS using the trademark then there is a general protection for sites using it in parody or satire. Also, they never took action against previous owners, so this does seem to be inconsistent. Frankly, Michelin need to get their wallet out..

[Khaptain]

I expected something else.

I didn't see Michel IN any of those guides, he was definately close by, but that's about it.

Now if that site had been JimmyInGuides the images would definately not have been SFW.

[The FunkeyGibbon]

Gotta agree with the majority here

If Mchelin were so slack as to miss this then it's their fault and they need to make a reasonable offer for the domain.

[Simon Harris]

Fortunate timing...

I managed to read this just before my colleague made me a cuppa...

... and saved myself from a new-keyboard situation.

[Jim Willsher]

Bloody fantastic

Gotta love it

[Destroy All Monsters]

But is there a pic of Michel in a Michelin Guide?

[PM.]

This is in a different website

www.michelinmichelinguides.com, that is .

[TeeCee]

Purpose?

"Exactly why Mascall decided to devote the site to repurposed mags featuring Platini's mug is not clear..."

I thought, from the pic, that the message; "Platini is a big girls' blouse" came across loud and clear myself. Have a look around some of the football blog sites devoted to teams that play in the Champions' League. That same message comes across, only without the illustrations.

[Andyf]

"a shed load of Delhi sandwiches"

That's taking outsourcing to a whole new level.....

[graeme leggett]

Chicken Tikka probably, very unlikely to be Corned beef

[Anonymous Coward]

Early entry for website of the year 2013.

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

Early entry for website of the year 2013.

Looks good to me, too. I like the "Lost Consonants" feel to the whole thing (judging it by the pic in the article, anyway). That's not a bad thing at all.

[Rob Carriere]

I would have had sympathy for Michelin's position if they had asked nicely first (and offered payment -- that seems to be a tradition among honest people when they want someone else's property). But starting of with lawyers at 20 paces...They clearly need the transfer of a significant amount of impulse through the chair interface.

[Anonymous Coward]

The lawyers are probably on a retainer so they would have paid them regardless...

At least this way they get some value for money.

[Marvin the Martian]

Expensive.

Now I've got to buy "Better know your hammer" (for those who cannot tell their frame hammer from a pein one), and a few other potential prezzies.

There should have been a "NSFWallet" warning with that page.

[Andy Farley]

I know there's very little crossover...

But the guy is on the Football 365 site, even the "eight miles in the other direction" is a trope from there.

There's an 80 page thread on there about it.

He's mainly just having a laugh. If they hadn't been so heavy handed he might have just let them have it for a nominal fee.

As is, good luck to him.