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Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

businessinsider.com

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Re: Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

#11
If a restaurant already has a contract with GrubHub and somewhere buried in the contract it gives GrubHub permission to do this... then it's still shady, but owners should also be reading their contracts closely -- and for owners who don't have a website at all, it could even be beneficial.

BUT... if GrubHub has done this (which they reportedly have, although they seem to be denying it) for businesses they haven't signed a contract with... then is that not highly illegal? There have to be laws against false representation in business, no? Whether cut-and-dried trademark infringement, or otherwise?

If that's the case, I hope they get a serious class-action suit against them with massive punitive damages. It's deeply unethical and anticompetitive, and basically smells of extortion.

Re: Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

#14
post #4

Some lawyer, somewhere, is likely drawing up a class action suit. Relatively easy to identify and sign up clients.

Except, you know, if Grubhub's contract with the restaurant allowed them to do this.

https://get.grubhub.com/legal/grubhub-restaurant-terms.html

There appears to be some clauses that offer GH some protection. However, the language doesn't really hint at what they ended up doing.

Re: Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

#15
post #13

If in 2019 you haven't bothered to buy the domain name for your restaurant you can't call this "cybersquatting", honestly.

They're setting up domain names similar to ones the restaurants already own (ie the restaurant owns .com, they buy .net and drive traffic to it)

Re: Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

#17
post #13

If in 2019 you haven't bothered to buy the domain name for your restaurant you can't call this "cybersquatting", honestly.

How many domains should I be expected to buy? Give me a restaurant and I could probably come up with 100 reasonable sounding domains the could potentially be that restaurant.

Re: Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

#18
post #13

If in 2019 you haven't bothered to buy the domain name for your restaurant you can't call this "cybersquatting", honestly.

> Grubhub registered 23,000 internet domains, many of them resembling the names of restaurants

Emphasis added.

Further, in The New Food Economy article [1]:

> Grubhub purchased three different domains containing versions of Shivane’s restaurant’s name—in 2012, 2013, and 2014.

[1] https://newfoodeconomy.org/grubhub-domain-purchases-thousand...

Re: Grubhub made websites for many restaurants, sometimes without owners’ knowledge

#20
post #4

Some lawyer, somewhere, is likely drawing up a class action suit. Relatively easy to identify and sign up clients.

Except, you know, if Grubhub's contract with the restaurant allowed them to do this.

Many predate any contractual agreement with the targeted restaurant.
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