Dwight Olson isn’t an attorney, but as a member of the intellectual property committee for the body that’s assuming governance of Internet domain names, he’s helping create a new kind of legal specialty.

Olson also is the San Diego-based vice president of business development for Data Securities International, a subsidiary of Iron Mountain Inc., a leading records management company.

Unlike other forms of intellectual property, domain names are not governed by statute, but regulated by the Internet Corp. of Assigning Names and Numbers. Known in the industry as ICANN, it is a nonprofit corporation formed to assume responsibility for the domain name system management, among other functions.

“The world is attempting to stabilize the Internet so that it’s more bulletproof,” Olson says. “With domain names we’re working out how the domain name and the trademark will live in harmony.”

For example, what if you wake up to find your new Internet takeout chain XtremeChicken.com has suddenly hatched in England as XtremeChicken.uk?

Generally, says Dwight, first in time is first in right. If the trademark already existed, that registry controls.

But the domain name can create a trademark as well.

“By getting the dot-com, I get a de facto trademark,” he says. “The domain name is far more powerful because publication is going to the Internet. The domain name is your trademark. Eventually, there will be a legal specialty in domain names.”

Even with ICANN, it’s a world wide wild west on the Internet. A proliferation of suffixes, such as .info and .tv, creates the potential to sell the universe of dot-com names over and over.

“There’s a lot of infrastructure in the buying and selling of domain names,” Olson says. “We’re working on an awful lot of these issues; how they work out in ICANN is how they will probably work out in the rest of the world.”

— Richard Acello