'Pokemon Gray' domain registered by Nintendo! Er... 3 years ago!

I don't normally do this but there has been a lot of shoddy journalism going round recently, even by organizations like IGN who should know better.

The story is that the domain name PokemonGray.com has been registered by a company called Melbourne IT, who do brand management and also happened to register PokemonBlackWhite.com for Nintendo, the official site for the latest games. Most of the articles credit Nintendo Buzz, who reported the same story two months ago.

This is basically where the reports ended. What they neglect to mention is that the domain has not been registered only recently; PokemonGray.com was first registered nearly 3 years ago! November 19th, 2008 to be precise.

It is possible that the domain was registered by someone else initially, then taken over by Nintendo - still, the latest it could have been under Nintendo's control is the last registration date - September 11th, 2010. (Incidentally, PokemonBlackWhite.com was first registered on January 1st, 2010, about three months before the games' names were even announced in Japan.)

What has also failed to be reported is that Nintendo/Melbourne IT own literally thousands of domain names, plenty of which relate to Pokemon. They include PokemonBrown.com, PokemonOpal.com, PokemonTopaz.com, PokemonAmethyst.com and PokemonCrimson.com and trademarks for most of those names.

So whichever way you look at it, this is not news. The existence of a domain name or trademark is no proof that a Pokemon game of said name will be released. Many companies regularly register speculative domains to protect their brand from domain squatters and the like. The next Pokemon game may very well be Pokemon Gray but equally Nintendo may decide the name sounds too dull and plump for something else.