Nissan Electric UK apparently didn't get the memo that Nissan Motors doesn't own the domain name Nissan.com. Instead, a man named Uzi Nissan does, and Uzi does not take kindly to the auto maker. A tweet was recently sent out by the UK division of Nissan's electric vehicle program that contained a link to Nissan.com.
Nissan Electric UK/Twitter
If you go to Nissan.com you are greeted immediately with this:
nissan.com
So at this point, you may be wondering what in the world is going on. How can Nissan Motors not own Nissan.com? Well, it's really not all that complicated. Basically, back in the day when the internet was new, unchartered territory, some companies weren't quick enough to buy domains that may be useful in the unforeseen future. In this case, Mr. Uzi Nissan legitimately needed a web page for his software and computer company so he figured, why not use his last name? The company was started in 1991, so Mr. Nissan argues that he started the company before Nissan Motors changed their name from Datsun. That didn't stop the large company from suing and seeking a whopping $10,000,000 in damages. Nissan Motors claimed he was just sitting on the name and was making a ton of cash on all the ad revenue generated from people accidentally going to his site thinking it was for Nissan's cars.
Uzi Nissan won the case, but he was forced to add a disclaimer stating he was not connected with Nissan Motors and he couldn't have any automotive based advertisements on the site.
There is a ton more to this very interesting story Here to read all about it.
Oh and on a positive note, apparently Uzi only charges $50 an hour for in-home computer repair. That's not too bad!
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