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Full-Text Articles in Law

Choreography And Copyright: Why The Law Must Twist And Turn To Serve The Dancing Industry, Gabrielle Mix Jul 2023

Choreography And Copyright: Why The Law Must Twist And Turn To Serve The Dancing Industry, Gabrielle Mix

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

With so many hurdles to jump over for choreographers to earn simple rights, it is time to re-evaluate the process of copyright protection for dance. In part A, this comment will discuss the history of copyright law and choreography. Part B will analyze the requirements copyright has placed on choreography and the struggles courts face in applying them. Part C will discuss the spread of online choreography and the difficulties these choreographers face regarding copyright protection. Part D will discuss additional reasons why choreographers are not seeking copyright protection. Part E will discuss the barriers choreographers face in proving infringement, …


Know When To Hold Them, When To Fold Them, And When To Walk Away: Tiktoks Are Professional Sports Franchises' Ace In Collective Bargaining Negotiations, Angelica Varona Apr 2023

Know When To Hold Them, When To Fold Them, And When To Walk Away: Tiktoks Are Professional Sports Franchises' Ace In Collective Bargaining Negotiations, Angelica Varona

Pepperdine Law Review

TikTok, the social media app, has become both a central force in entertainment, creating a slew of influencers and young celebrities, as well as an important tool in all things branding and marketing. Athletes have recognized the value of social media and fan engagement and have taken to becoming content-creators on the platform. The growing presence of professional athletes on the app brings up important issues of copyrightability and ownership of the content they are producing. This Comment considers the nature of athlete content-creation on TikTok as well as the employment scheme and contractual responsibilities that form a part of …


Are Cryptopunks Copyrightable?, Brian L. Frye Aug 2022

Are Cryptopunks Copyrightable?, Brian L. Frye

Pepperdine Law Review

Larva Labs’ CryptoPunks NFTs are iconic. Created in 2017, they were among the first NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain. Four years later, they are among the most valuable, selling for anywhere from $200,000 to millions of dollars. The CryptoPunks collection consists of 10,000 NFTs, each of which is associated with a unique CryptoPunks image. Everyone knows who owns each CryptoPunks NFT. The Ethereum blockchain provides indelible proof. But people disagree about who owns - and who should own - the copyright in the CryptoPunks images. Most CryptoPunks NFT owners believe they should own the copyright in the image associated with …


"Stronger" Together: Kanye Could Have Owned His Masters By Engaging In Collective Bargaining, L. Camille Cordova May 2022

"Stronger" Together: Kanye Could Have Owned His Masters By Engaging In Collective Bargaining, L. Camille Cordova

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Because the legislature and judiciary have failed to protect recording artists’ interests, this article proposes that engaging in collective bargaining will re-balance the bargaining positions of the major record labels and recording artists to create a mutually beneficial agreement that gives recording artists a termination of rights clause that mirrors section 203 of the 1976 Copyright Act. By contracting with a major record label, recording artists are automatically eligible for union membership to the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists union (“SAG-AFTRA”), who have experience negotiating other collective-bargaining agreements with these record labels. This agreement would provide …


The Chinese Copyright Dream, Sean A. Pager, Eric Priest Apr 2022

The Chinese Copyright Dream, Sean A. Pager, Eric Priest

Pepperdine Law Review

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s vision of the “Chinese Dream” has captured the popular imagination. As a slogan, the Chinese Dream is intentionally broad. Intended to inspire rather than prescribe, it captures diverse aspirations including dreams of material prosperity, environmental sustainability, national rejuvenation, and global leadership. The Dream’s ramifications continue to ricochet through state policy echelons and lend themselves to competing interpretations. In that spirit, we advance a modest suggestion: that the Chinese Dream should be, at least in part, a dream about copyright law. A more effective copyright system would bolster China’s creative industries, generating a diverse supply of high-quality …


De-Gentrified Black Genius: Blockchain, Copyright, And The Disintermediation Of Creativity, Tonya M. Evans Apr 2022

De-Gentrified Black Genius: Blockchain, Copyright, And The Disintermediation Of Creativity, Tonya M. Evans

Pepperdine Law Review

In a 2016 acceptance speech during the Black Entertainment Television (BET) Awards, actor and activist Jesse Williams used the phrase “gentrifying our genius” to refer to the insidious process of misappropriating the cultural and artistic productions of Black creators, inventors, and innovators. In that speech, he poignantly and unapologetically condemned racial discrimination and cultural misappropriation. This Article chronicles the nefarious history of the creative disempowerment of creators of color and then imagines an empowering future for those who successfully exploit their creations by fully leveraging copyright ownership and transfer termination. To that end, I reference the considerable scholarship of Professor …


The Long And Winding Road To Effective Copyright Protection In China, Peter K. Yu Apr 2022

The Long And Winding Road To Effective Copyright Protection In China, Peter K. Yu

Pepperdine Law Review

In November 2020, China adopted the Third Amendment to the Copyright Law, providing a major overhaul of its copyright regime. This Amendment entered into effect on June 1, 2021. The last time the regime was completely revamped was in October 2001, when the Copyright Law was amended two months before China joined the World Trade Organization. While U.S. policymakers and industry groups have had mixed reactions to the recent Amendment, the new law presents an opportunity to take stock of the progress China has made in the copyright reform process. This Article begins by mapping the long and winding road …


Thieves In The Temple: The Scandal Of Copyright Registration And African- American Artists, Kevin J. Greene Apr 2022

Thieves In The Temple: The Scandal Of Copyright Registration And African- American Artists, Kevin J. Greene

Pepperdine Law Review

Copyright registration is the currency of copyright transactions in music, film, and television and is essential for pursuing infringement claims and ownership disputes. Despite copyright registration’s outsized reach across the copyright spectrum and importance to the copyright industries, the U.S. Copyright Office does not verify claims of copyright authorship or ownership. No express mechanism exists to challenge false copyright registrations in the Copyright Office, and the penalties for falsely claiming copyright authorship are paltry in comparison to the potential gains. This Article contends that lax copyright registration standards call into question the legitimacy of the registration system and that the …


The Music Industry: Drowning In The Stream, Jonathan Croskrey Mar 2021

The Music Industry: Drowning In The Stream, Jonathan Croskrey

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

The Department of Justice is reviewing two of it's oldest consent decrees, which were entered into with ASCAP and BMI. ASCAP and BMI are the two original performing rights organizations and existed well before streaming. This article analyzes copyright and antirust law through the lens of modern technology and the current landscape of the music industry. It examines whether the consent decrees should be removed or modified and what the consequences of each would be.


Creative Destruction: Copyright's Fair Use Doctrine And The Moral Right Of Integrity, Cathay Y. N. Smith Jun 2020

Creative Destruction: Copyright's Fair Use Doctrine And The Moral Right Of Integrity, Cathay Y. N. Smith

Pepperdine Law Review

This Paper explores the role of copyright’s fair use doctrine as a limit on the moral right of integrity. The moral right of integrity gives an author the right to prevent any distortion, modification, or mutilation of their work that prejudices their honor or reputation. Actions that have been found to violate an author’s moral right of integrity include, for instance, altering a mural by painting clothing over nude figures, selling separated panels of a single work of art, and displaying sculptures with holiday ribbons. At the same time, copyright’s fair use doctrine allows follow-on creators to transform original works …


Copyrighting Experiences: How Copyright Law Applies To Virtual Reality Programs, Alexis Dunne Oct 2019

Copyrighting Experiences: How Copyright Law Applies To Virtual Reality Programs, Alexis Dunne

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

This note will attempt to shed light on the question of what kind of protection copyright law affords VR experiences. Part II discusses the nature of VR experiences and their implementation through specifically tailored VR technology. Part III provides an overview of copyright protection, its limitations, and specifically the history of the copyrightability of computer programs. Parts IV and V outline case law relevant to the discussion of the copyrightability of different types of VR experiences and how that case law similarly or dissimilarly apply to the protection of VR experiences. Part IV focuses on protecting VR experiences as a …


Star Athletica Tells The Fashion Industry To Knock-It-Off With The Knockoffs, Samantha Burdick Apr 2019

Star Athletica Tells The Fashion Industry To Knock-It-Off With The Knockoffs, Samantha Burdick

Pepperdine Law Review

At any given fast fashion store, there may be a near exact replica of a ‘designer’ clothing item that sells for four times less than the amount it would at a luxury retailer. Wait—isn’t that illegal? After the Supreme Court’s landmark separability test created in Star Athletica, the answer may soon be yes. Fast fashion chains make their money exploiting the historical lack of copyright protection in the fashion industry. Lamps, shoes, and clothes have long been held ineligible for copyright protection because the utilitarian features are inseparable from the artistic. In other words, the part of clothing that is …


Trends In Fashion Law: Striking The Proper Balance Between Protecting The Art Form And Sustaining A Thriving Online Market, Elisabeth Johnson Dec 2018

Trends In Fashion Law: Striking The Proper Balance Between Protecting The Art Form And Sustaining A Thriving Online Market, Elisabeth Johnson

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

No abstract provided.


Piracy On Peer-To-Peer File Sharing Networks: Why A Streamlined Online Dispute Resolution System Should Not Be Forgotten In The Shadow Of A Federal Small Claims Tribunal, Naomi Gemmell Sep 2017

Piracy On Peer-To-Peer File Sharing Networks: Why A Streamlined Online Dispute Resolution System Should Not Be Forgotten In The Shadow Of A Federal Small Claims Tribunal, Naomi Gemmell

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

This Article proposes application of an ADR system for resolving online copyright disputes related to P2P file sharing. Section II provides an overview of P2P file sharing networks and associated copyright infringement. Section III explores current approaches that fall short in resolving P2P copyright disputes, namely the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, litigation, and private agreements. Section IV examines the two primary proposed solutions to online copyright disputes: alternative dispute resolution and federal small claims. Section V recommends that a streamlined online dispute resolution system is necessary (even if a federal small claims tribunal is adopted), and concludes.


The Right-Based View Of The Cathedral: Liability Rules And Corrective Justice, Omri Rachum-Twaig, Ohad Somech Jul 2017

The Right-Based View Of The Cathedral: Liability Rules And Corrective Justice, Omri Rachum-Twaig, Ohad Somech

Pepperdine Law Review

In their celebrated paper, Calabresi and Melamed offered a framework, often referred to as the ‘‘Cathedral’’ analysis, which explains when and why entitlements should be protected using two main sets of rules—property rules and liability rules. This framework is now widely used to explain some private law doctrines. However, cases that are easily explained as applications of liability rules are usually difficult to explain under the private law theory of correlative corrective justice. This is because the basic idea underlying corrective justice conflicts with the notion of rules that allow the nonconsensual property appropriation subject to compensation. In this Article, …


Consent Decrees In The Streaming Era: Digital Withdrawal, Fractional Licensing, And § 114(I), Steven J. Gagliano Jul 2017

Consent Decrees In The Streaming Era: Digital Withdrawal, Fractional Licensing, And § 114(I), Steven J. Gagliano

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

Clear disagreement exists about how best to reconcile the copyright protections afforded to songwriters with the antitrust considerations protecting consumers. Songwriter public performance royalty collections account for over $2 billion in annual U.S. revenue, roughly 90% of which is collected by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) and Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI). ASCAP and BMI are performance rights organizations (PROs) regulated by seventy-five-year-old consent decrees. After the Second Circuit determined that these consent decrees prohibit music publishers from selectively withdrawing their new media rights from ASCAP and BMI to directly negotiating with new media services, the PROs …


Is Copyright Evolving Or Mutating? What American Broadcasting Cos. V. Aereo, Inc. Says About U.S. Copyright Law In The Twenty-First Century, Allison Davenport Jun 2016

Is Copyright Evolving Or Mutating? What American Broadcasting Cos. V. Aereo, Inc. Says About U.S. Copyright Law In The Twenty-First Century, Allison Davenport

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

In this article, I will look in-depth at the case of American Broadcasting Cos. v. Aereo, Inc. (Aereo). Aereo centers on an alleged infringement of American Broadcasting Company's (ABC)'s public performance right that was achieved through a complicated technological process meant to circumvent the law. In its opinion, the Supreme Court of the United States tries to stretch the language of the Copyright Act to apply to new technology by analogizing it with more familiar processes, while the dissent calls for reform to come from Congress, not the courts. Before my discussion of the Aereo decision, I will discuss the …


Following An International Copyright Regime At A Large National Cost: Is It Worth It?, Vaishali Khatri Jan 2014

Following An International Copyright Regime At A Large National Cost: Is It Worth It?, Vaishali Khatri

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

The main question at issue is which view of copyright law the United States should adhere to. Founders of American copyright law based our Constitution on utilitarian principles that promote the spread of knowledge and information to the general public. It has always been held that innovation and creativity were of core importance in an efficiently functioning democracy. With the passing of Section 514, the United States digressed from its national roots in order to comply with an international regime of copyright law. This decision in Golan takes steps to afford private economic benefit to a few copyright holders at …


The General Revision Of The Copyright Law - From Bare Bones To Corpulence - A Partial Overview, Andrew E. Katz May 2013

The General Revision Of The Copyright Law - From Bare Bones To Corpulence - A Partial Overview, Andrew E. Katz

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


The 1976 Copyright Revision Act And Authors' Rights: A Negative Overview, Arthur Stanley Katz May 2013

The 1976 Copyright Revision Act And Authors' Rights: A Negative Overview, Arthur Stanley Katz

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


The Business Exemption Of § 110(5) Of The Copyright Act Violates International Treaty Obligations Under Trips: Will Congress Honor Its Commitments?, Charles Leininger Apr 2013

The Business Exemption Of § 110(5) Of The Copyright Act Violates International Treaty Obligations Under Trips: Will Congress Honor Its Commitments?, Charles Leininger

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.


Copyright And The Musical Arrangement: An Analysis Of The Law And Problems Pertaining To This Specialized Form Of Derivative Work, Joel L. Friedman Feb 2013

Copyright And The Musical Arrangement: An Analysis Of The Law And Problems Pertaining To This Specialized Form Of Derivative Work, Joel L. Friedman

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


Protection Of Intellectual Property Rights In Computers And Computer Programs: Recent Developments , Alan C. Rose Feb 2013

Protection Of Intellectual Property Rights In Computers And Computer Programs: Recent Developments , Alan C. Rose

Pepperdine Law Review

The following article examines the protection offered to computers and computer programs, under the various applicable patent, copyright and trade secret laws. Concerning patent protection; the author discusses the history and current status of the patent laws, and analyzes in detail the landmark case of Diamond v. Diehr. Discussed also is an analysis of copyright protection for computer programs, offered by the 1980 amendments to section 117 of the 1976 Copyright Act; which paved the way for the increased protection.


Copyright And The First Amendment: Freedom Or Monopoly Of Expression?, Henry S. Hoberman Jan 2013

Copyright And The First Amendment: Freedom Or Monopoly Of Expression?, Henry S. Hoberman

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


States Escape Liability For Copyright Infringement?, Michelle V. Francis Jan 2013

States Escape Liability For Copyright Infringement?, Michelle V. Francis

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


Musical Copyright Infringement: The Replacement Of Arnstein V. Porter - A More Comprehensive Use Of Expert Testimony And The Implementation Of An "Actual Audience" Test , Michelle V. Francis Nov 2012

Musical Copyright Infringement: The Replacement Of Arnstein V. Porter - A More Comprehensive Use Of Expert Testimony And The Implementation Of An "Actual Audience" Test , Michelle V. Francis

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


Community For Creative Non-Violence V. Reid: New Certainty For The Copyright Work For Hire Doctrine , Katherine B. Marik Nov 2012

Community For Creative Non-Violence V. Reid: New Certainty For The Copyright Work For Hire Doctrine , Katherine B. Marik

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


Fun & Profit: When Commercial Parodies Constitute Copyright Or Trademark Infringement, Tammi A. Gauthier Nov 2012

Fun & Profit: When Commercial Parodies Constitute Copyright Or Trademark Infringement, Tammi A. Gauthier

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


An Economic View Of Innovation And Property Right Protection In The Expanded Regulatory State, J. Miles Hanisee Nov 2012

An Economic View Of Innovation And Property Right Protection In The Expanded Regulatory State, J. Miles Hanisee

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.


As Unoriginal As They Wanna Be: Upholding Musical Parody In Campell V. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., Gregory D. Deutsch Oct 2012

As Unoriginal As They Wanna Be: Upholding Musical Parody In Campell V. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., Gregory D. Deutsch

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.