A Moscow vendor who used to deal in plastic windows defended in court his right to use the website Windows.ru, contested by software maker Miscrosoft.
Moscow Arbitration Court ruled on Wednesday that Dmitry Shapovalov can keep the rights to the domain name “windows.ru,” which he obtained back in 1998.
But the court also declared Microsoft, which produces the Windows operating systems, the second administrator of the domain, but only in relation to software and computer products.
Now the domain has two administrators. The court did not elaborate on how they are supposed to split the website, while Shapovalov said he expects to continue using it and Microsoft to monitor the usage, ensuring it is not utilized for advertising computer-related products, Marker.ru said. Microsoft did not comment as of Wednesday evening.
“They’ve got their windows, I got mine. We could have sorted it out by telephone,” Shapovalov was cited as saying.
The software maker did not sue Shapovalov until 2010, when Windows.ru began to redirect visitors to an aviation industry website supported by the businessman.
Shapovalov said earlier he was in the process of liquidating his plastic windows business at the time of the lawsuit and simply wanted to boost attendance at the aviation website.
Windows.ru is currently redirecting to the page for “window” (the architectural element) on Russian Wikipedia.
