While a hundred million bucks can register a lot of domain names, Sex.com is fighting to keep its own. A pending court case will establish whether or not domain names are property.rnrn
The domain of the San Francisco-based adult clearinghouse was registered in 1994 by Match.com founder Gary Kremen. Less than a year later, a letter forged by Stephen Cohen, now a fugitive, requested Verisign (formerly Network Solutions, Inc.) to transfer ownership of Sex.com to his name. NSI did and Cohen proceeded to develop Sex.com into an adult portal.rnrn
It wasn't for a few years that Kremen decided to take the matter to court, but he was finally re-awarded ownership of Sex.com in 2000, at which point he started from scratch and turned the site into the adult search engine it is today.rnrn
Kremer was awarded undisclosed damages from Cohen before the latter went on the lam, but "Sex.com has been trying to hold Verisign accountable to the tune of $100 million in lost revenue," said Sex.com Public Relations director Joanna Posner to AVN.com. San Francisco's Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has asked the state Supreme Court, the final authority on California Law, to intervene and decide whether a domain name is property.rnrn
"To this day," Posner said, "Verisign maintains that they can take away a domain name at the blink of an eye."rnrn
Establishing a registered domain as virtual property would change that and establish Verisign's culpability in acting on a forged instrument.
