Van Morrison wins domain name dispute

Van the Man gets by with a little help from his lawyers...

Van Morrison has won the right to use the vanmorrison.com domain after disputing its use by an unofficial fan club. The WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organistion) arbitration panel ruled that Van Morrison held common law trademark rights over the domain as "Van Morrison" was not a common name and had only become internationally recognisable through the singer's success. WIPO also ruled against the Caribbean-based fan club on the grounds that the domain name did not transfer surfers to a legitimate website and despite having registered it over three years ago, the fan club had no intention of building a website.