Saurik is a household name today because he developed what is often termed as the other app store. Cydia has been the source of joy for jailbroken iPhone, iPad and iPod touch owners for over 3 years now. Jay Freeman who is commonly referred to as Saurik has now filed a lawsuit pleading for access to the cydia.com domain name.
Jay Freeman is also the owner of Saurikit LLC, a limited liability company that has gained much attention due to the fact that Cydia is owned by Saurik himself. Unfortunately Saurik does not have access to the cydia.com domain name, something that is obviously of much value to him and his company. Up till now, negotiations with the owner of cydia.com have failed leading to the filing of a lawsuit by Saurik.
Ever since Cydia blew up and got amazing attention, cydia.com was quickly transformed in to a forum for discussions on Apple and its products, obviously in a bid to capitalize on the popularity of Cydia. Currently the website is hosted at cydia.saurik.com. In March Saurikit LLC lost a dispute under the UDRP, the Uniform Domain Name Resolution Policy. Back then, the company lost because the owner had registered cydia.com six years before Saurikit LLC started using the Cydia brand.
The lawsuit suggests that Cykon, the company or group that is operating Cydia.com had changed their domain name in order to display content about Apple which is to some extent true as the website says that its an Apple forum for discussion of iPhones, iPads, iPods etc. Saurikit LLC claims that visitors will be confused by the name and will be led to think that cydia.com is somehow affiliated with the Cydia Store. The company wants to have use of the the Cydia trademark banned and have Verisign (the registrar) transfer the domain name to it and have its legal costs paid.
One of the other allegation made by Saurikit LLC in the law suit is that cydia.com diminishes the reputation of Cydia, because it has a weak web page which currently states that it is suspended due to "massive malicious attacks and overwhelming spam activities by hackers." Saurikit has alleged that as a result of this, visitors might consider Cydia and its products as unreliable and unworthy.
Jay Freeman has made some very valid claims in his lawsuit and we are anxious to see what the defendants have to say in reply. Though it is highly likely that Saurikit LLC will win this lawsuit.
More updates on this, as they happen.