Law Commons^™

Briefing Note: 45th Meeting Of The Wipo Standing Committee On Copyright And Related Rights, Sean Flynn

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

This analysis provides a historical and legal overview of the principle agenda items to be discussed at the 45th meeting of the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights.

An Unsung Success Story: A Forty-Year Retrospective On U.S. Communications Policy, Christopher S. Yoo

All Faculty Scholarship

Looking backwards on the occasion of Telecommunications Policy’s fortieth anniversary reveals just how far U.S. communications policy has come. All of the major challenges of 1976, such as promoting competition in customer premises equipment, long distance, and television networking, have largely been overcome. Moreover, new issues that emerged later, such as competition in local telephone service and multichannel video program distribution, have also largely been solved. More often than not, the solution has been the result of structural changes that enhanced facilities-based competition rather than agency-imposed behavioral requirements. Moreover, close inspection reveals that in most cases, prodding by the courts …

The Inadvisability Of Nonuniformity In The Licensing Of Cover Songs, Yolanda M. King

College of Law Faculty Publications

In February 2015, the U.S. Copyright Office released a report entitled Copyright and the Music Marketplace, which summarizes its study of the music industry and recommends significant revisions to copyright law in response to the rapidly changing demands of the industry. Among its recommendations, the Copyright Office proposes an amendment to section 115(a)(2) of the Copyright Act. Currently, section 115(a)(2), referred to as the compulsory licensing provision of copyright law, permits someone to record a new version of a previously recorded and publicly distributed song, regardless of the format of the newly recorded version. The revised section 115(a)(2) would require …

Slides: The Economic Benefits Of Completing Initial Reclamation Successfully For Oil And Gas, David Chenoweth, David Holland, Gerald Jacob, Lindsey Kruckenberg, John Rizza, Bryan Whiteley

Best Management Practices (BMPs): What? How? And Why? (May 26)

Presenters: Joe Schneider and Colby Reid, Western States Reclamation, Inc.

34 slides

Ten Years After: Bartnicki V. Vopper As Laboratory For First Amendment Advocacy And Analysis, Eric Easton

All Faculty Scholarship

How many ways can one approach a First Amendment analysis? What influences a lawyer or a judge to select one analytical approach over another? And what is the long-term effect of a court's choice of one over another? In Bartnicki v. Vopper, a 2001 case in which the U.S. Supreme Court considered federal and state statutes prohibiting the disclosure of illegally intercepted telephone conversations, we are privileged to have a small laboratory through which to study the first two questions. And, from the vantage point of ten years, we ought to be able to make some informed predictions as to …

‘Right Of Selfishness’ Vis-À-Vis Media Pluralism In The Us And In Europe: The Crucial Role Of Broadcasting At The Verge Of Private Enterprise And Public Trusteeship, Niels Lutzhoeft

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

Few areas of law raise the question as to the delimitation of the public vis-à-vis the private sphere as forcefully as broadcasting does. And few businesses display the dual nature inherent in nature radio and TV broadcasting: economic versus cultural good. In Continental Europe, until the 1980s, broadcasting was subject to State monopolies that ought to ensure media pluralism. Likewise, the U.S. Supreme Court, embracing a scarcity rationale, qualified the First Amendment in the realm of broadcasting primarily as a right of the listeners and viewers to receive a wide array of information and opinions. In Red Lion, the Court …

Stealth Risks Of Regulating Stealth Marketing: A Comment On Ellen Goodman's 'Stealth Marketing And Editorial Integrity', Eric Goldman

Faculty Publications

In this response piece to Ellen Goodman's Stealth Marketing and Editorial Integrity, 85 Tex. L. Rev. 83 (2006), Professor Goldman explores the potential adverse consequences of Professor Goodman's proposal for sponsorship disclosure laws. More specifically, Goldman argues that any deliberation of such disclosure laws must consider: (i) why consumers desire to know the source of content; (ii) whether consumer distrust of marketing wrongly affects consumers' evaluation of content; and (iii) the adverse effects of noisy disclosures.

The Fcc’S New Indecency Enforcement Policy And Its European Counterparts: A Cautionary Tale, Michael Botein, Dariusz Adamski

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Changing Channels And Bridging Divides: The Failure And Redemption Of American Broadcast Television Regulation, Anthony E. Varona

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

In Changing Channels and Bridging Divides: The Failure and Redemption of American Broadcast Television Regulation Professor Varona analyzes how the Supreme Court, Congress and the FCC have defined the legal duties of commercial broadcasters throughout the maturation of the television industry. First, he shows how the public trustee doctrine has failed, with broadcasters today airing very little 'public interest' programming. Second, he examines how and why the FCC has failed to effectively elucidate and enforce the public trustee doctrine, focusing on the irreconcilable First Amendment and commercial tensions inherent in the public trustee doctrine since its inception and the 'capture' …

Ideas Of The Marketplace: A Guide To The 1996 Telecommunications Act,, Michael I. Meyerson

All Faculty Scholarship

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 represented an enormous experimental step towards deregulating the telecommunications marketplace while opening it up to competition. With an eye towards breaking up the telecommunications monopolies held by local telephone service providers, the Act created regulations that forced local carriers to share their market and their resources with other telecommunications providers. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 itself is extremely complex. This article is a "guided tour" through the major provisions of the Act.

The first step in understanding the Telecommunications Act of 1996 is to understand how the telecommunications industry operates. Part two of this article …

Congress, The Fcc, And The Search For The Public Trustee, Neal Devins

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Broadcasting And Speech, Jonathan Weinberg

Law Faculty Research Publications

It is illegal to speak over the airwaves without a broadcast license. The FCC grants those licenses, and decides whether they will be renewed, on the basis of a vague "public interest" standard. The resulting system of broadcast regulation conflicts, starkly and gratuitously, with ordinary free speech philosophy. In this Article, the author argues that that inconsistency is crucially linked to inadequacies in free speech theory itself Conventional free speech theory ignores the extent to which imbalances of private power limit freedom of expression. It presupposes that public discourse takes place on a rational plane. The author explores the link …

The Hard Case Of Broadcast Indecency, Lili Levi

Articles

No abstract provided.

New York Times Co V Sullivan: The 'Actual Malice' – Standard And Editorial Decision-Making, Geoffrey Bennett, Russel L. Weaver

Journal Articles

In an effort to explore conflicting views of the New York Times decision, this article compares how the British media functions under Britain's more restrictive defamation laws with how the US media functions under the actual malice standard. It does so based on interviews with reporters, editors, defamation lawyers, and others involved in the media in an effort to understand how they decide which stories to publish, and to gain some understanding of how libel laws affect editorial decision-making.

Broadcasting And The Administrative Process In Japan And The United States, Jonathan Weinberg

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Has The First Amendment Arrived For Broadcasting?, Tom A. Collins

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Cable Television's New Legal Universe: Early Judicial Response To The Cable Act, Michael I. Meyerson

All Faculty Scholarship

On October 29, 1984, a new era began in the relationship between law and cable television. On that day, the first major law regulation cable television, the Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984,was signed into law.

Early judicial attempts to interpret the Cable Act revealed the difficulties judges had with understanding the new legal regimen. A common thread running through these varied cases, if any, was the courts' apparent lack of appreciation of the Act's complexity. Many, though not all, decisions appear to misread congressional language and misinterpret congressional intent. The first part of this Article will discuss this problem …

The Cable Communications Policy Act Of 1984: A Balancing Act On The Coaxial Wires, Michael I. Meyerson

All Faculty Scholarship

After three decades of what Chief Justice Burger termed ‘the almost explosive development’ of cable television, Congress updated the Communications Act of 1934 with the Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984. The Act represents the culmination of a ‘decade long effort to update the Communications Act of 1934 . . . and bring our outdated communications laws into the information age.’ The 1984 Cable Act was a complicated piece of legislation, the result of countless compromises and political deals. This Article explains how Congress attempted to balance the competing, and sometimes mutually exclusive, interests of the cable operators, cities, video …

Restrictions On Public Broadcasters' Rights To Editorialize, Susan H. Williams

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Constitutional Considerations Of Multiple Media Ownership Regulation By The Federal Communications Commission, Jon L. Mills, John Moynahan, Richard Perlini, George Mcclure

UF Law Faculty Publications

Promoting the dissemination of diverse ideas with a minimum of governmental interference is the goal of the first amendment in protecting free press and free media. This goal is implicit in the public interest mandate of the Communications Act of 1934. A precise balance between restraint and diversity in first amendment policy appears impossible, but the process of decision should reflect both, with deference to restraint where possible. The Federal Communication Commission's Order in Docket 18110 failed to strike such a balance; any future action regarding cross-ownership of broadcast stations by newspapers would benefit by an increased recognition of the …

Television, Tort Law, And Federalism, Robert M. O'Neil

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.