Domaining.com apparently is having some database issues – the database is currently being restored on a new server as the owner Francois tells us. It appears this week domaining blogs will all miss their referral traffic from Domaining.com – it remains interesting to see if any of the other aggregates is able to benefit from this down time. Good luck to Francois with restoring he server.

Gavel By Joe Gratz (Flickr)

The Valuate.com service by Domaining.com‘s founder Francois Carrillo has now added a trademark checker functionality, which automatically scans the submitted domains for potential trademark claims. The service was built by the Estibot team.

Francois suggests trying those samples if you have trouble coming up with domains to try:

mikrosoft.com
googleads.com
iphonestore.com

He also points out that the following things should be kept in mind when using the service:

• EVERY word is trademarked (ex: apple, orange, great, elephant) so it’s pointless to have a TM scanner that checks every TM because 99% of domains will have some generic TM.
• TM checker only works on BIG fortune 1,000 companies + their products (ex: Microsoft => xbox => halo) + smaller industry companies (ex: Verisign, godaddy)
• TM checker optimized for companies that have history of suing domainers (ex: Verizon, Viacom, Facebook, Twitter, etc)
• It’s NOT [a] comprehensive TM check. Always consult good TM lawyer for [a] real analysis. It’s only good for identifying obvious TMs in portfolio.
• It detects typos. You can even adjust probability match (default is 65%, but you can bring to even 30% to make very broad).