MikeRoweSoft
 

From www.cnn.com

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) -- It's Microsoft versus Mike Rowe-soft.

Rowe, a 17-year-old high school senior and Web designer from Victoria, has angered the software giant by registering an Internet site with the address www.MikeRoweSoft.com.

"Since my name is Mike Rowe, I thought it would be funny to add 'soft' to the end of it," said Rowe.

Microsoft, however, is not amused.

It has demanded that he give up his domain name. In November, Rowe received a letter from Microsoft's Canadian lawyers informing him he was committing copyright infringement.

"I didn't think they would get all their high-priced lawyers to come after me," Rowe said.

He wrote back asking to be compensated for giving up his name. Microsoft's lawyers offered him $10 in U.S. funds. Then he asked for $10,000.

On Thursday, he received a 25-page letter accusing him of trying to force Microsoft into giving him a large settlement.

"I never even thought of getting anything out of them," he said, adding that he only asked for the $10,000 because he was "sort of mad at them for only offering 10 bucks."

Microsoft company spokesman Jim Desler said Sunday, "Microsoft has been in communication with Mr. Rowe in a good faith effort to reach a mutually agreeable resolution."

Rowe is keeping his sense of humor.

"It's not their name. It's my name. I just think it's kind of funny that they'd go after a 17-year-old," Rowe said.

I hope he gets $100,000

This makes me lose ALOT of respect for microsoft... ditto on that 100000 thing... im sure if he ever uses the word "fuck" in a letter they will also accuse him of harrassement... stupid microsoft

Roweful...

Eh, Microsoft will pay. $10,000 is probably less than what's in Bill Gates' couch cushions. The whole $10 was pretty funny though..

$10 is roughly the amount of money for one month of shitty webhosting.

That is pathetic, how is it copy right infragment, its his name and it happened to sound the same and he added soft at the end, their is plenty of companies that do that. Bill Gates and Microsoft r just a bunch of fucking ass holes who some how prolly feel insulted by that. Wut a bunch of fucking douchebags, he could sue them for harrasing him for something that wont last that long anywayz. Its already down now to??????WTF, I would keep the site up and be like 200K or it stays up as long as I want and you don't have the rights to stop me.

Ditto with Chrome. Thats some fucking bullshit.

Hmm really? Lemme check.

/me goes to www.bluecapacity.com

My god your right!

Actually, reading the article FARK posted, MS actually DOES have a valid complaint.

Based on the fact that he wanted to make it a COMPANY, Microsoft is fully within their rights. It's definately a copyright violation here. You're not going to start a beverage company named "Koka-Cola" even if your name is Koka, simple as that. Mr. Rowe wanted name recognition by sounding like a major software company. Now, if it were a parody site or something, Rowe would have a case..

I like how they call him a computer geek.

Whos idea was it to sup mod you anyway.... Not mine!