Some profit off Va. Tech domain names

GoDaddy.com shut down one site purporting to raise money for the victims' families after university officials said they weren't aware of any such charity, Jones said.

But in general, there are few restrictions on what people can register. The Internet's key oversight agency, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, has arbitration procedures for resolving disputes, but they cover only trademarks and service marks, which can include names of celebrities. Federal laws also focus on trademark owners, not the names of non-famous individuals such as the victims.

"It's kind of exploitative, but it's not really cybersquatting," University of South Carolina cyberspace law professor Ann Bartow said. "It's socially, normatively disgusting, but it's not trademark bad faith."

McChesney, who has been "hugely anti-gun" since his brother shot him in the face with a BB gun when he was a child, said he hopes to use some of his domains to draw attention to what he calls an epidemic of gun violence in America.

He also plans to give away his memorial domain names to Virginia Tech students, and has donated one so far. He hopes to sell others, such as VaTechTheMovie.com, to companies. So far, he hasn't sold any.

He understands that many will vilify him. But he doesn't think he's doing anything wrong.

"What I'm doing is the equivalent of rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic," he said. "Period."

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