Posted on 12/05/2025 1:15:00 AM PST by dennisw
An Arizona man looking for a huge payday for his ‘Lambo.com’ domain wound up left with nothing but legal fees and a loss of his initial investment, after a United States district court ruled in favor of Lamborghini and awarded the carmaker the domain name without having to pay a dime.
It all started in February 2018, according to court documents, when Richard Blair purchased the "Lambo.com" domain for $10,000. In April 2022, Lamborghini filed a complaint with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Arbitration and Mediation Center seeking a transfer of domain name under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP). In August of that year, the panel determined that Blair was acting in bad faith and ordered the domain be transferred to Lamborghini. Blair filed a lawsuit in an attempt to reverse this decision.
Since he purchased the Lambo.com domain, Blair listed it for sale several times, as the court filings reveal. It was first listed on August 6, 2020, for $1,129,298. On December 23, 2020, the price increased to $1.5 million. On January 27, 2021, the price was $3.3 million. That rose to $12 million on September 23, 2021. On August 11, 2022, the price shot up to 50 million euros (about $58 million). On September 7, 2023, the asking price hit $75 million. Prospective buyers reportedly made offers to Blair for the domain, but he refused them all.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
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My Maserati does 185
I lost my license, now I don’t drive
I have a limo, ride in the back
I lock the doors in case I’m attacked
Judge probably got a payday.
His problem was that he bought the domain name and sat on it. He should have made a simple website showing pictures of Lamborghinis and registered the name to that website.
Greedy fool should have taken one of the earlier offers but instead he got f’all.
Relief from cybersquatters?
Bingo. That would have threaded the needle as to anti-cybersquatting laws and regulations.
Yes!
In the early days of the web, someone AMD.COM, and wanted more money than the processor/video card wanted to pay. He used the site to sell fake cat poop, complete with pictures. It was up for years. I suspect he got some money.
Judge probably hates cybersquatters as much as I do.
He gets to keep his legs, unbroken.
Yeah, it's been more than two decades that cybersquatting was addressed for most situations.
He wouldn't have increased the price if he didn't see a market at that price. My guess is buyers met his earlier targets so he kept increasing his target. It's like selling your home in minutes... I should have asked for more. He turned down good profits for better profits.
He simply got too greedy.
That is the rule of the Internet naming. If a company has a trademark for a word, they can claim a domain name using it.
The idiot should have sold as soon as the first offer was made.
I’ve known many people who held large corporate domain names and sold for $10k to $25k, but I have also known others to lose it all in court challenges.
On September 7, 2023, the asking price hit $75 million. Prospective buyers reportedly made offers to Blair for the domain, but he refused them all.
What a Homer Simpson moment fells like
I can’t complain, but sometimes I still do.
I didn’t see it in the article but I assume Lamborghini made him some “go away” settlement offer that would have made him a decent, possibly even great, return on his investment and saved Lamborghini a lot of headache. I’m sure his attorney advised him to take the offer because that’s the best outcome he can hope for.
He was stupid. He should have asked for $50,000 and they would have paid as it would have been easier than courts.
He got greedy and got nothing.
I recall a story about someone registering the names of promising athletes then selling them the right to use their own names when they became better known. Whatever happened with that?
Ruh-roh.
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