This is why Nissan tweeting a link to nissan.com was an embarrassing mistake

Something strange happened in the hours leading up to Nissan reveal its new Leaf electric car. The Japanese auto maker posted to Twitter a message about the car, inviting followers to watch the unveiling live on YouTube.

But instead of linking to Nissan.co.uk or any of the brand's other sites, the Twitter account in question, which covers the company from a UK and electric vehicle (EV) angle, pointed followers to nissan.com, which does not belong to the car company.

Instead, nissan.com has belonged to Uzi Nissan, an Israeli immigrant based in North Carolina, since 1994, before the car maker had its own site.

Mr Nissan created the website to promote his computer software company, which he founded in 1991.

But there's more to the story than Nissan's social media manager mixing up website addresses. As Jalopnik discovered, a row between Nissan Motor Corporation and Nissan Computer has been going on for years.

The site, as you can see for yourself here, shows crossed-out Nissan logos and documents a lawsuit lodged by the car company against Uzi Nissan in 1999, asking for $10m (£7.6m) in damages. Nissan claimed Uzi was domain-squatting and raised concern over the advertisement revenue he was earning from people visiting the site by accident.

As documented by Mr Nissan on a separate website, his legal battle with Nissan dragged on for over eight years. In January 2008, Uzi wrote how the car maker had "been unrelenting in its lawsuit against us and despite that they lost; they subsequently filed a motion asking the court to award them millions of dollars in attorneys' fees."

A month later, the court ruled Nissan was not entitled to the fees, and would instead have to pay Mr Nissan $58,000 in costs; an amount he claims is "less than 2% of what the cost was to defend this case." This would suggest defending the case cost Nissan Computers in the region of $3m.