Intellectual Property Law

Placements in settings that expose students to the practice of business and/or intellectual property law are within the broad scope of the clinic. Students in this clinical component spend 10 (2-credit) or 15 (3-credit) hours per week on fieldwork. Given the broad range of possible placements, students might work in government agencies, private law firms, nonprofit organizations, the legal department of businesses, or in placements through which students may work in the area of compliance. Students will submit weekly journals, describing and reflecting on their experiences in the field, and will meet in a series of seminars with the course instructor and/or the Clinical Director to explore the relationship between the principles covered in the substantive class and the students’ fieldwork. While Business Organizations is the co/prerequisite for all placements, certain Intellectual Property courses may additionally be required by the course instructor for eligibility for placements in the Intellectual Property area. This course satisfies the Experiential Education/Professional Skills Requirement.

This course is a detailed examination of the entire range of copyright law, including protection for literary, musical, artistic, and other works of authorship. The course is centered on a consideration of the 1976 federal copyright statute, as amended by several recent pieces of legislation, including the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the DMCA). Topics covered include what kinds of work are protected by copyright, ownership of copyright, and the rights and remedies provided by copyright law.

This seminar will investigate key cutting-edge issues in US patent, copyright, trademark, and trade-secret law, using a mostly theoretical approach. For the first of half of the semester, we will simultaneously read theoretical works on intellectual property, as well as case law and articles discussing major current debates in US intellectual property law. We will then try to use the theoretical insights we gain from the former to help us solve the doctrinal problems raised in the latter. For example: Should we let celebrities control use of their names, even in the absence of consumer confusion? Should fashion designs be protected by copyright? Should human genes be patentable? Starting in the middle of the semester, students will each present on a key issue in intellectual property of interest to them, and then develop that presentation into a research paper submitted at the end of the course. Students are required to have completed at least one other course in the intellectual property field as a prerequisite. Any of the following courses will serve as a prerequisite: Copyright Law, Intellectual Property, Internet Law, Patent Law, Patent Litigation, or Trademarks and Unfair Competition This course may be offered every other year.

This course will explore legal and policy issues raised by computers, the Internet, and the digital age, such as electronic security, privacy, free speech, online crime, online contracts, jurisdiction, trademarks, copyright, and patents. Many of these issues are familiar in other contexts, and this course will address whether and how the legal doctrines change when extended to an online context. Although class discussions will include computer and Internet technology, no prior technical background or knowledge is required. Any technology concepts required for the discussion will be explained in class.

Focuses on the legal and business aspects of entertainment related to the music industry. Topics include artist personal management agreements, recording agreements, production agreements, music publishing, film music, band agreements, and new technologies. Emphasis is placed on the role of the entertainment lawyer in the areas of negotiating and drafting contracts, copyright and trademark, and the formation of legal entities. This course may be offered every other year.

This course will survey the three major fields of intellectual property: patent, trademark, and copyright. The primary objective will be to examine the fundamental principles of each discipline. Students will read cases and statutory materials relating to topics such as registration, protection, and infringement. Although class materials will emphasize the essentials of intellectual property doctrine, the course also will explore important societal issues, such as the impact of technology (for example, television, computers, and the Internet) on the development of these critical areas of 21st-century law.

Legal professionals in law firms, legal departments, courts, legaltech companies, and a range of other legal contexts need to identify and solve problems by thinking holistically about the intersection of law, innovation, and technology. During this course, students will enter current conversations about legal innovation, including implications for legal ethics, access to justice, legal professional wellbeing, ALSPs, Web 3.0, LaaS, and other possibilities; investigate theories of change and process/project management, innovation, and design thinking; take “core samples” or “snapshots” of past and present legal technologies to study their effectiveness; learn to communicate possibilities clearly and concisely; and practice solving a real-world problem facing legal professionals in law firms, legal departments, courts, or the people they serve. To do so, students will complete weekly reading/watching assignments; prepare, deliver, and critique short, weekly presentations; and submit a final project. As a result, students who take this course will be able to improve the experience of law for legal professionals and everyone else. While this course is open to every student, full or part-time employment, clinic, internship, or clerkship experience in law firms, legal departments, or courts will be very beneficial. Prior coursework in legal ethics, compliance, accounting, and other applied disciplines will also be beneficial.

Surveys several topics that are essential to patent practitioners, such as the standards for patentability, patent applications, and patent infringement. These topics also are of interest to those who do not intend to practice patent law but who recognize that clients’ intellectual property needs occasionally require them to work with patent lawyers.

Teaches the fundamentals of patent infringement litigation, including pre-filing considerations, discovery, specialized proceedings, the use of liability and damages experts, summary judgment practice, trial preparation, and trial. Please check the most recent course registration information to determine if this course meets the Experiential Education requirement. This course may be offered every other year. Please note that students must be currently taking or have previously taken at least one of the corequisite courses

This course explores the many legal issues that concern information privacy in a world of big data, including such topics as the Fair Credit Reporting Act, federal and state financial privacy laws, consumer data privacy regulation, and First Amendment limitations on privacy regulation. This course will be taught as a colloquium?after an initial introduction to legal and philosophical perspectives on information privacy, teaching will be undertaken by students in the course: each student (or team of students) will be responsible for leading discussion on a topic related to data privacy.

This course explores the many legal issues that concern information privacy in the law enforcement context, including the scope of the Fourth Amendment in the digital age, the privacy implications of emerging surveillance technology, and digital searches and seizures. This course will be taught as a colloquium?after an initial introduction to legal and philosophical perspectives on information privacy, teaching will be undertaken by students in the course: each student (or team of students) will be responsible for leading discussion on a topic related to privacy and law enforcement.

This survey of sports law investigates a wide variety of topics in the context of sports law. For example, the course considers the nature, operation, and evolution of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Both the equal protection and due process clauses of the Constitution also are studied, as applied in an athletic setting, as are the treatment and rights of women and foreign student athletes. The differing treatment by the courts of the worker’s compensation–e.g., is a recruited athlete an employee of his or her university?–are analyzed. Antitrust law, as applied to both amateur and professional sports, also is reviewed. Title IX and drug testing are considered, as are the role and ethics of lawyers involved at the various levels. Representation of the athlete by both lawyer and nonlawyer agents and the role of unions and collective bargaining in professional sports are considered, as are both tort and contract law.

In this course, students investigate the state and federal systems of trademark law. This study includes trademark creation, registration, protection, and litigation. The class also explores other, more general theories of unfair competition, including right of publicity law.