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Does Facebook have a strictly professional website yet?

Can I run a website with Facebook-like domain names?

  • For example,  http://facbook12345.com, http://facebooktutor.com, http://facebooklovers.com or anything you can think of that includes "facebook." Will there be any problem from Facebook, Inc? I want to make a website with "facebook" in the domain name. I have not thought of the domain name but I will use "facebook" as prefix or suffix. Will there be any problem from Facebook, Inc if run a startup with a facebook-like domain name ? There is a popular website "allfacebook.com"; I don't think they have faced a problem from Facebook Inc till now.

  • Answer:

    You need to talk to a lawyer familiar with the UDRP (Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy). There is no simple answer to this question, as it will depend on (among other things) what you will be doing with the domain name.  If your site will be in some sense competing with facebook, that's trouble.  If your site could be confused with facebook (or appears to be somehow official or associated with facebook), that's trouble. But suppose your website is 'http://facebooktutor.com.com' and it exists to teach people how to use Facebook, and it doesn't look like Facebook, and it has a clear and obvious disclaimer that it is unofficial and not affiliated with Facebook, then you'd be on safer grounds. So, as I said, talk to a lawyer.  But also be serious about assessing the business case for doing this in the first place.

Jimmy Wales at Quora Visit the source

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The problem you'll run into is one of trademarks. Facebook certainly has trademarked their name, which then cannot be used in any business where there is potential that a customer could be confused by it.

Christopher Reiss

Don't do it. I had a friend of mine had a url very similar to that of travel republic. They ran a blog on it, which wasn't a dedicated travel blog. Travel Republic got in touch, and despite being very rude and flippant, were threatening legal action, claiming that the travel Republic name was being used to try and gain extra traffic, extra ad revenue, etc. In my eyes, they didn't have a leg to stand on, but I can only hope that they at least had some guidelines from solicitors before going round making (what would otherwise be) empty threats. The worst thing is, the site had been going for almost a year and was starting to gain popularity and search engine rankings for some arcane keywords. That's most likely how they were found. My friend would have been just a little bit less "inconvenienced" if she was asked, nay forced -  to give up her site right at the beginning, before she had invested time in developing the site. Do you want to be met with the same fate? It's very hard to even contemplate giving up everything you have worked for over a period of months... Last but not least, I cannot imagine what possible reason you have for needing to run a site with facebook in the url. You can rank for various keywords that are related to your business, even if these keywords contain facebook as a word (such as facebook trainer) without needing facebook in the url. Search engines have moved on from ranking sites based on the homepage url.

Vlad Levachyov

Definite trademark issues. Last thing you want is to build up a site and a brand just for ti to be ruined by a ceasea dn desist from Facebook lawyers.

Jamie Anderson

"Will there be any problem" or the underlying question "can I get away with it" is the wrong question.  I think if you ask the right question you will have the answer.

John Stark

This is what is known as cyber squatting, and it's illegal.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybersquatting and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anticybersquatting_Consumer_Protection_ActThis answer is not a substitute for professional legal advice....

Sean M. Flaim

No you cannot Facebook would content that these sites look as if it is a part of their company when it is not. Better to steer away from these type of names You can get a different name and then below or some place on the top you can always highlight that your business is related to facebook lovers

Ganesh Ranganathan

You can run, but you cannot hide... At least from Facebook lawyers and for any domain having "facebook" in it.

Arseny Kardash

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