Scien TOMogy - Church of Scientology's Response

Church of Scientology's Response

The Web site drew media attention when the Church of Scientology's attorneys Moxon & Kobrin contacted Stollery, claiming the ScienTOMogy domain name was an infringement of their trademark, despite being a different word by one letter. In September 2005, the Church of Scientology issued a cease and desist order to Stollery demanding he shut down the site and transfer ownership to the Church, threatening him with a $100,000 lawsuit. The Church's law firm stated that "ScienTOMogy" would cause a likelihood of confusion with "Scientology," violating the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1125(a). The Church of Scientology's letter stated: "You are hereby on notice that the registration and use of this domain name in this fashion has caused your name to be falsely associated with our client’s registered mark, SCIENTOLOGY..The fact that you have changed one letter..does not protect you from trademark infringement." Helena Kobrin, a lawyer for the Church of Scientology, was quoted as saying: "You can't use somebody's trademark, regardless of what you're saying, if you haven't been given permission."

The site responded with a statement: "The site is purely satirical and is for entertainment. It contains no fact nor claims to do so. The site clearly states in its header, 'This site has absolutely no connection whatsoever with the Church of Scientology, it's affiliated organisations or, needless to say, Tom Cruise'." Stollery originally relented and agreed to change the domain name to "passionofcruise.info" on October 13, 2005, which E! News took to be a parody of the film The Passion of the Christ.

After consulting with his lawyers in October 2005, Stollery responded to the Church with a far more aggressive stance. Now believing the accusation to be completely frivolous, Stollery publicly refused, challenging the Church with: "I'm keeping my domain, see you in court." Again in an interview with ONE News, Stollery reiterated that he was going to retain rights to "ScienTOMogy", and not transfer the URL to the Church of Scientology, as they had requested. After the media attention, Stollery said he began to receive "annoying calls" from local Scientologists. "The first few I was stupid enough to answer, but now they just call and call and call. When I did speak to 'a church member here in Auckland' he kept insisting over and over that we meet to talk about my 'vendetta' with the church."