Canadian singer Celine Dion has won the rights to the Internet domain name www.celinedion.com in a U.N. panel ruling. The name had been registered by Jeff Burgar of High Prairie, Alberta, but Dion and her recording company, Sony Music Entertainment, took their claim for the Web site to the U.N. World Intellectual Property Organization.
The panel ruled that Burgar had no legitimate right to the name and ordered it transferred to Dion. The ruling was released Friday. Burgar contended that he was using the Web site as a fan club, that he was not using the name for commercial gain and that the site was clearly marked as “unauthorized” so nobody would mistake it for Dion ¹s official site. But arbitrator William R. Cornish said Burgar had a history of registering the names of celebrities and that the fan club pages had only been added recently.