Microsoft sent 25 pages of legal threats to a teenager over MikeRoweSoft․com.
They offered him $10 for it, even though he was 17 years old and his legal birth name was Mike Rowe.
He put their threats online, crashed his server with 250,000 visitors in 12 hours, and auctioned Microsoft's legal papers on eBay.
This is the story of Mike Rowe and how a teenager backed a tech giant into a PR nightmare.
August 5, 2003
- Mike Rowe, 17 years old, starts an after school web design business in Victoria, Canada
- adds "Soft" to the end of his own birth name
- registers MikeRoweSoft․com for $10
November 19, 2003
- Microsoft's lawyers email Mike demanding he hand over the domain for sounding like Microsoft
- when Mike asks for compensation to rebuild his site, they offer him $10
- annoyed at the $10 insult, the teenager counters with $10,000
January 14, 2004
- a FedEx Priority Overnight package lands at Mike's house
- inside is an inch thick WIPO book and 25 pages of cease and desist threats accusing a high schooler of cybersquatting
January 15 to 19, 2004
- Mike posts the fight on his website and goes to the press
- 250,000 page views hit MikeRoweSoft․com in 12 hours and crash his server
- strangers donate over $6,000 to his defense fund and a lawyer steps up for free
- trademark experts point out Microsoft could actually lose in court because Mike is using his real birth name
Late January to March 2004
- trapped in global backlash, Microsoft admits it took the matter too seriously and folds into a settlement
- Mike trades the domain for paid expenses, certification training, an Xbox, and a paid family trip to Redmond headquarters
- he donates most of his $6,000 defense fund to a hospice for terminally ill children
- then he lists Microsoft's 25 pages of legal threats on eBay, pulling 500,000 views and cashing out another $1,037
22 years later, Microsoft is worth $3T, and plain MikeRoweSoft․com redirects to Microsoft․com.
Except if you open MikeRoweSoft․com over HTTPS right now, you don't even get a webpage.
You get a browser security warning, because the software giant never even bothered putting an SSL certificate on the domain it bullied a teenager to take.
His actual January 2004 post right after the FedEx box landed.
At 17, do you take the Xbox and the Redmond trip, or take the free lawyer and fight Microsoft in court?