CAR enthusiast Vic Tucker could face an expensive reverse for wanting to post his interest on the Internet -- a "fine" of 3,000 US dollars or even having to pay damages of $100,000 to the Ford motor giant.

But why should such a multinational colossus be coming down so heavily on a retired teacher from Burnley?

Mr Tucker's mistake, it seems, was to trespass into trademark territory by registering jaguarF1racing.com as an Internet domain -- the web equivalent of a telephone number -- on which fanzine-type details of Ford-owned Jaguar's Formula One racing team's performances would be given.

Not only have Ford ordered him to return the domain which he bought and paid for, but have also demanded the $3,000 penalty they have set for infringements of their trademark. If he refuses, he faces a bumper lawsuit in US courts.

But Mr Tucker isn't refusing. He's told Ford they can have the domain -- and that he did not know he was doing anything wrong. Yet, they still want the $3,000 and it looks like the 65-year-old will have to pay it if he doesn't want an horrendous battle with the company's lawyers.

Surely, though, this problem could be sorted out far better by the use of common sense.

True, the Internet is in many ways still the cyberspace equivalent of the Wild West -- a high-tech frontierland in which the law and regulation are often lacking and where cowboy-style opportunists have been posting domains built around the names of famous products and celebrities and auctioning them off in the hope of making lots of a big cash killing money.

And, yes, major companies have spent vast sums and years of hard work establishing the reputations that lie behind their trademarks and corporate identities and have perfectly good reasons for seeking to protect them.

Yet is Ford's threatening response to all who have been peddling domain names containing their trademarks on Internet the one Mr Tucker deserves? He says that when he registered the name of his domain, he gave the company all the details about himself.

That hardly smacks of an Internet Arthur Daley. Ford would do well to talk and find out. For if, as it is portrayed by the worried Mr Tucker, this is a case of Goliath versus the ant, it could be an unpleasant blot on the company's carefully-guarded image if the ant is crushed by a hasty blow of the corporate sledgehammer.