Possible Trademark Issues

There is a new site called zeen.com. Around the same time, I purchased a few websites with zeen in the name, such as beerzeen.com, sexzeen.com, etc. Before I did that, I searched the US trademark office online and others. No trademark, yet for them listed. Also, other websites already use zeen in their domain name, and some even own zeen as a trademark. There are several water filtration companies, HP has a tablet addon called "zeen". If I purchased it before they trademarked (or before it is listed on USA.gov trademark website as of 4/17/12), can they sue me? Also, does the use of the word zeen in a few other places make it more difficult to trademark?

This is not a legal issue but a factual one. Certainly the facts you put out seem to make a violation of trademark suit less likely to be successful. However, that does not prevent them from suing you and trying to prove up their side of the case.

Trademarks arrive from use in commerce, not by registration. The fact that the the trademark is not registered doesn't mean you are home free. Further squatting on domains or trademarks without actually using them in commerce do not give you any rights.

Domain rights are distinct from trademarks. Again if you are squatting in bad faith and someone else has a legitimate corporate name or trademark right to the name, you WILL LOSE the domain if they file the $100 fee to start UDRP.

tranquility said:

This is not a legal issue but a factual one. Certainly the facts you put out seem to make a violation of trademark suit less likely to be successful. However, that does not prevent them from suing you and trying to prove up their side of the case.

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Good answers!!
They have not used them in commerce, (I think), the only thing they have is a URL:
http://zeen.com/

QUESTION:

If I put on the site that we are not affiliated in any way to zeen.com, does that help?

On Zeen.com one can reserve a username, that's all. Is that considered commerce?

I am not squatting, but I dont have the $$ to build them yet. If I build something, all be it simple, squatting will not be an issue, correct?

Cheers.

Jeff

Posting a disclaimer might mitigate damages, but will not prevent them.