After an enterprising, Delhi-based app developer bought the rights to the Jiohotstar domain and asked Reliance and Viacom18 to fund his college tuition in exchange, another techie has come forward with a similar experience with the company, hinting that he does not think a deal will be worked out.
Writing on social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter), techie Amit Bhawani shared his “battle” with Reliance for the Jio domain between 2012-2014.
Livemint has reached out to Reliance and JioCinema for their statements and this story will be updated to reflect the same.
“There’s a trending discussion about the JioHotstar domain purchase, so I thought I’d share my own story. Reliance sent me a Legal Notice about the domains http://reliancejio.com and http://riljio.com, which I booked back in 2012. Interestingly, Jio was officially announced only in 2015, so do the math!” he said.
He added, “Back then, I was into blogging and often bought domains speculatively. Rumors were floating around that “Jio” might be Reliance’s upcoming brand, so I took a chance and registered those domains, thinking they might turn out to be valuable. Both http://reliancejio.com and http://riljio.com seemed like prime domains for Reliance Industries.”
“Two years later, in 2014, I received a legal notice from Reliance’s team claiming that I was holding their trademarked property. Since they did officially own the trademark, and I was busy with other professional commitments, I decided not to go toe-to-toe with such a big company,” he added.
“I tried my luck and asked for $25,000 for the domains, but they responded with a firm notice, clearly showing they had the upper hand. Realizing it wasn’t worth the fight, I handed over the domains without any fuss. No drama, no twist — just a straightforward ending,” he stated.
He ended it with a reference to the new viral story on the matter, saying, “I’m sharing this because there’s speculation that Reliance might pay a huge sum for the JioHotstar domain, but in my experience, it doesn’t always work out that way!”
